


Shattered Serenity

by PuppyLuver256



Series: Life and Times in the Habit-Bora Household [6]
Category: Smile For Me (Video Game)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, M/M, Major Character Injury, Mild Blood, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Robbery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-08
Updated: 2020-08-28
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:01:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 28,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24611191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PuppyLuver256/pseuds/PuppyLuver256
Summary: When his flower shop is attacked in the middle of the night by masked assailants, Boris Habit falls into the worst emotional state he's experienced since the previous year's events.
Relationships: Dr. Boris Habit & Putunia Mollar, Kamal Bora & Putunia Mollar, Kamal Bora/Dr. Boris Habit
Series: Life and Times in the Habit-Bora Household [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1552876
Comments: 14
Kudos: 51





	1. As Subtle As a Rock Through a Glass Pane

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: This story has been in planning for several months, long before recent events had taken place. As such, while there are police in this story, I acknowledge that police in real life are generally not the benevolent protectors of the peace that they are often portrayed as to privileged individuals such as myself. If the presence of fictional police seen in a neutral light in this story upsets you at present, I understand and can reassure you that their presence is brief in both this chapter and one other one, and I will not be offended if even that is enough to make you consider passing this story up entirely. Maybe you can come back to this in the future, maybe not, the choice is yours and either way is valid.
> 
> Note: This story takes place a couple months after Removing the Rose’s Thorns in this series’ timeline, sometime in mid-May 1995.

For all the tumultuous events in his life, the past year of Boris Habit’s life had seen considerable improvements. Sure, there was the whole Habitat thing, which by anyone’s account was an absolute disaster even if it hadn’t gotten as bad as it would have if his plan had succeeded. But his encounter with the florist’s child had helped him realize he needed to change. He’d managed to get some help, both professionally and through reconciliation with a former employee and friend. Their relationship had mended considerably in the months following, and they had even started dating. It was still a little weird for Boris to remember he and Kamal were more than boyfriends now, as they had been officially married for only a few weeks now. And even though it felt like a lot longer due to Kamal having adopted her while they were still merely dating, Boris had been Putunia’s “pops” for a few weeks now as well, at least legally speaking.

In roughly twelve months he’d gone from being a very sad lonely man with the closest thing he had to a family being... _not the best_ , putting it extremely lightly...to having a loving husband and daughter, said husband’s very welcoming family on the other side of the country, and a good handful of new caring friends. They’d even recently adopted a cat! It’d probably take a while to get her to stop taking unprovoked swipes at Webster or getting dangerously close to his newly grown tooth lilies (both for the lilies’ sake and her own, and at least the lilies were all in easily moved pots), but on the whole things were looking up for Boris. He was genuinely happy, the happiest he'd been for as long as he could remember.

So of course, when he drove up to the flower shop he’d been running for the past couple months only to see the large storefront window in pieces and the front door partially open, it was like a knife had been shoved into his heart.

At first, he couldn’t believe it was real. He remembered that someone had painted a rude word across the door fairly early on in the shop’s existence, but he’d been able to take that in stride and simply paint over it. It was a one-off event likely by an immature teenager or something. But this was so much worse. So much more of an impact. But it wasn’t real! It _couldn’t_ be real!

“If I close my ‘eyes’ it will go a-way,” he murmured to himself. He tried to do just that, turning away from the travesty before him and closing his eyes, slowly counting backwards from ten to try and calm himself. He’d only gotten to seven before the tears started welling up, and once that happened he couldn’t stop them from flowing. Sobbing and trying to wipe the tears from his eyes, Boris knew he’d have to confront this directly sooner or later. As difficult as it was, he stepped out of his car and approached the wrecked shop.

As he drew closer to his shop, the situation definitely began to feel more real. It looked so much worse up close, and he could see that not only the large main window had been shattered, but the smaller window on the door as well. The world felt like it was moving in slow motion. There was a low buzzing sound in his mind as he approached, its volume growing in intensity as he cautiously reached for the door. Once he opened the door, he recognized the sound for what it was.

Screams.

Dozens of tiny pained screams, overwhelming every bit of his senses, and as he covered his ears on instinct and tried to piece together what was going on he could see the source of the sound. So many flowers were on the ground, pots smashed, leaves and petals trampled on, at least one of the coolers left wide open and cold air blowing out. They were crying out in distress, in a voice only Boris could hear, and it was more than he could handle. Trying his best not to cry out himself because he knew he wouldn’t be able to stop once he did, he shakily made his way to the phone. His foot nudged something that probably wasn’t a ceramic shard or anything he stocked, but he wasn’t paying attention. He just had to get to that phone. He had to get help, he had to call someone...

\-----

The front-desk phone was ringing like crazy, and Dr. Keally would be wondering why it had yet to be answered if he hadn’t remembered that Janelle had offered to go get everyone breakfast that morning. No one else seemed to be around to answer, so even though he wasn’t very experienced with the clerical part of the office’s running, he figured that it was better he answered rather than let it be ignored. He casually walked over to the unmanned desk and picked up the phone’s receiver. “Bora-Keally Dentistry?” he greeted the person on the other end of the line.

“ _Is Kamale there???_ ” a vaguely familiar, fairly deep voice pleaded, sobbing in noticeable distress. “ _I need himes eye needs h elp..._ ”

“Boris?” Keally asked. It was the only name he could think to place to a voice that sounded like that, but then again anyone would sound off when in that state of duress. “Oh my god, Boris, is that you?” he asked again. “What’s going on, what happened?”

There was no direct response to his question, just more incoherent sobbing followed by a choked-up “ _I need hi-hi-hiiiimmmmm..._ ”

“I, uh...oh god...” Keally didn't know what to do. He was used to helping comfort patients with dental anxiety, but talking down someone who had clearly gone through a terrible trauma was out of his area of expertise. He supposed the only thing he really could do was to help Boris get someone who could help him better than he could. “I’m going to go get him for you, all right?” he asked, trying to speak calmly and hoping it would help ease him a bit. “I’ll put the phone down for just a second, not hanging up. Are you going to be okay without someone on the line for a bit?”

No answer aside from continued sobbing and the occasional sniffle. Keally supposed he would have to take that emotional relative silence as a yes. He placed the phone’s receiver on the desk beside its cradle and quickly wrote a note for no one to hang up, then turned and sped-walked to Kamal’s office. His colleague had left his door open, as he usually did, and rather than waltz right in he gently knocked on the door frame. “C’mon in,” Kamal said without looking up from the papers he was working on.

“Hey, Kamal, your husband’s on the phone and he’s asking for you,” Keally said.

“I’d love to talk but I'm kind of in a bind right now, gotta get this stuff organized real quick before the patients start comin’ in,” Kamal replied. “Tell him I love him and that I’ll call him back once I’m on break.”

“No, I think it’s pretty urgent,” Keally insisted. “He was crying heavily and didn’t say anything other than he needs you. It sounds like something serious happened over there...”

“ _ **WHAT.**_ ” Kamal immediately put the papers down and stood up. He looked half-ready to leap over the desk itself, but instead he darted around it and pushed past Keally in his rush to the front. He immediately made for the phone, still in its careful placement, and put it up to his ear. “Boris, are you still there?” he asked. “What’s going on?”

“ _Ev-ry thing’s brokneeeeen!!_ ” Boris wailed, and despite his best efforts to keep it near him, Kamal had to hold the phone away due to the volume. “ _The glass, all’ve the pots, my hart! Lilyyyy!!_ ” he sobbed. “ _Aaaoohhh, my gaawwd..._ ”

“Okay, Boris, I know it’s gonna be tough but try and calm down if you can,” Kamal said. In truth he was freaking out too, but at least he knew he personally was completely safe. He couldn’t say the same about Boris just yet. “Are you okay? Physically, anyway?” he asked, trying to keep his own voice as calm as possible to avoid escalating Boris's distress. “Is there anyone there with you?”

Silence on the other end, aside from Boris’s choked sobs. Eventually he spoke up again. “ _They brokee..._ ” he said in a hushed tone. “ _They brokmy lilleys... They broke them t hey broKe themn..._ ”

“It’s gonna be okay, hon, please just stay on the line for me—” Kamal heard a loud clatter on the other end, and after that silence. “Hello? Boris? Boris, are you still there?” No answer. By this point Kamal’s own anxiety was reaching its limits, and if he couldn’t get Boris to let him know things were okay himself, there was only one thing he could think to do. “All right then, I’m just gonna come to you.”

Kamal hung up the phone and turned on his heels to head out, before he noticed Keally had been standing there and listening in on his half of the conversation. He looked just as concerned as he himself felt. “Don’t waste time explaining the situation,” Keally told him. “Just go. I’ll take care of your appointments.”

“Thanks, Chris.” Keally nodded and moved out of the way to give Kamal more room to get out. As he grabbed his keys and headed for the door, he nearly collided with Janelle and almost knocked the large box of donuts out her hand. “Sorry, gotta go, family emergency!”

“Uh, what do you want me to do with your share?” Janelle asked, confused. “They’re Krispy Kreme, best warm!”

“Just split mine between the rest of you, I don’t _care!_ ” He burst through the door and practically ran across the parking lot to his car. Krispy Kreme could wait. Hell, the entire Krispy Kreme franchise could go out of business that minute for all he cared. Boris was in distress _right now_ , potentially in danger as far as he knew, and in that moment that was the most important thing on his mind.

\-----

He’d dropped the phone without thinking once he saw the lilies. Truth be told, Boris kept most of his recently grown tooth lilies at home where they were safe and close by, but he did have one that lived at the shop. And now it was on the floor and in tatters, along with a few leftover Easter lilies, turk’s caps, and one or two stargazers. All ruined. It was like that day again, so long ago when he was a scared little boy, except now he was a distraught nearly-middle-aged man yet the hurt very much felt the same.

And the screaming was tenfold this time.

“Ime...sorry...” Boris sobbed. “Iy’m so sorrey I couldent protect yooouuu...” The tears were blurring his vision. He tried to stop crying. Crying wasn’t going to help anything right now, aside from letting him release the emotion, but he needed to save that for later. He had to try and fix this as best he could while there was still time. He dropped to his knees and started frantically trying to pick up the pieces. Ceramic and glass and petals and leaves and dirt, it all mixed together before him and all he could think was to move the big pieces and try to save the flowers that could still make it.

“Stupid, stew-pitt Boris,” he muttered to himself as he cleaned up the big bits of everything. “Whye did you ‘think’ yuo could havbe a hapbie life doign whamt you lovbed, everey time you get in-vlolved with flowers it ends up baddlie— _AAH!_ ” A sharp physical pain went through his hands to accompany the emotional one. He sat up to examine his hands, which now had several large glass shards embedded in the palms. Before the remnants of medical knowledge locked far away in his brain could come back to tell him this would be a bad idea, Boris instinctively pulled one of the largest shards out from its place on his right hand and immediately wished he hadn’t. Bright red blood began to stream forth from the now fully exposed wound, and that coupled with the pain and the still-present anguish opened a stream several feet up. The tears flooded forth and wouldn't stop. His vision was starting to tunnel. He wouldn't be able to fix anything like this...

Boris just sat there on the floor, curling up into a ball, blood and tears dripping onto his clothes and the floor. He felt helpless and useless in that moment. Helpless, useless, and discounting the flowers crying along with him, completely alone.

\-----

“I swear to god, Boris, you better be okay or I’m gonna lose it!”

Kamal had finally found a place to park somewhere relatively close to Boris’s flower shop, and was in the process of getting out of the car when a realization hit him. He hadn’t been considering it in his panic, but what if whoever had broken into the shop was still in there? “Someone could still be there with him, like a stickup...” he murmured. “But he _was_ crying a lot, and really loud, you wouldn’t do that if you’re trying to secretly call for help... Then again, this _is_ Boris, I don’t know if ‘talking quietly while crying and panicking’ is something he would think of.” Either way he looked at it, there was no real other option he could think of than to at least check on him. If there was present danger, he remembered that there was a pay phone nearby. He could easily duck out and call for better prepared help if need be, as much as it pained him to think about that possibility.

As he approached the shop, he could see that it was worse than he’d imagined. He had been hoping that maybe someone had picked the lock to get in and accidentally broken some things on their way in or out, but it was clear from the shattered window that the destruction was very much intentional. Kamal cautiously opened the door, a safer option than trying to climb over the window frame, and surveyed the damage. All the pot pieces and torn flowers littering the ground in among glass and potting soil, he could only imagine the turmoil Boris was feeling. In what he imagined might be the epicenter of the shattered window pieces was a large chunk of broken asphalt, which he figured had been used to break the window in the first place.

And there was the phone, still dangling off the side of the counter by its cord. Yet no sign of Boris yet... Kamal felt a deep pit forming in his stomach. Where the hell had he _oh god there was blood on the floor_. A long smear of still-fresh blood, leading to the corner of the shop where a large vaguely human-like shape sat, silent but occasionally twitching in an exhausted sob.

“Boris...?” Kamal asked tentatively. Boris lifted his head a little, his curls cascading over his face and shadowing it in a way that looked a bit strange given the lighting. His eyes were a lot more red than normal, though Kamal couldn’t tell whether it was due to crying or...something else. Something he didn’t really want to think about, given what it meant... “Boris, are you okay?” he asked. “Where’d, um, where’d this blood come from?” Boris didn’t respond aside from showing Kamal his hands, open gashes where the glass had sliced through and he had unwisely removed pieces himself. “Jesus lord on a stick...” he gasped. “Did you see anyone else in here?” A light shake of the head. “So you did this to yourself? On accident, I hope...” This time he got a nod. Whether he had thrown out his voice from crying or had just lost his words from the overwhelming despair of this event Kamal didn’t know, and quite frankly it didn’t matter as much that Boris couldn’t verbally speak to him right now so long as he was safe. Well, “safe”, the man _did_ have huge glass shards embedded in his palms.

Kamal made his way over to Boris, carefully so as to avoid stepping on anything that could either be dangerous to him or upsetting to his already distraught husband. He knelt down to Boris’s level as best he could and gently cupped his face in his hands. “Hey, it's gonna be okay,” he said in a soft whisper. “You know what we're gonna do?” Boris didn't answer, his gaze somewhat unfocused. “You still have those cameras set up from the graffiti incident, right?” A little nod. “Well, what we’re gonna do first is we’re gonna get some first aid on these cuts, then we can check out that footage and call the police. Okay?”

Boris let out a little choked sob, but even so he nodded once more. Kamal ran his hands through Boris’s hair for comfort (taking note of the scratches near his ears as he did so—must’ve grabbed at his head with those big garden claws of his for some reason) and stood back up to go looking for the first aid kit. Boris gingerly stood up as well, a hard task given his injuries, and slowly stumbled around in search of a broom or something to finish cleaning. Kamal noticed this and gently grabbed his arm. “Hey, no, we gotta take care of your hands first,” he reminded him, guiding him to the stool behind the counter to sit and wait.

Thankfully it wasn’t too hard to find the first aid kit. It was equipped mainly for dealing with the sort of minor nicks and scrapes one would expect to get while working with plant matter and scissors and such, but it would have to do. He grabbed a roll of gauze bandages and some disinfectant and returned to Boris’s side. “Can you give me your hand, please?” he asked, and Boris tiredly obliged. There was still a large glass shard embedded in there, so Kamal tried to remove it as gently as possible so he could actually put the bandages on, as well as Boris’s wedding ring (which he made a mental note to clean the blood off of asap). Boris winced as he did so, and it hurt Kamal’s heart to see him in so much pain, both physically and emotionally. He cleaned and dressed the wounds as best he could, giving his hand a few gentle kisses after taking care of that and then repeating the process with the other hand. His work wasn’t the best, but it was a lot better than just leaving them to bleed out or get infected. It would be enough until they could get to the hospital.

Once the injuries were taken care of, Kamal went to the phone and put the receiver back in its cradle. “I’ll get you some water and then I’ll call the cops, all right?” he asked.

Boris nodded, and after a few seconds he glanced up, seeming a bit more in focus. “...can you...get...get sume for the...other flowlers they dident...get two in the Back...?” His voice was hoarse, likely from the crying earlier, but at least it had come back to him momentarily.

“Of course,” Kamal said, patting him gently on the shoulder. He went to the sink and filled one of the smaller watering cans and a plastic cup he had grabbed from a stack nearby. After handing Boris his cup and making sure he could actually hold it with his injuries, he went into the back room and watered every undamaged flower he came across. A good number of stock managed to come out of this whole ordeal unscathed, and he figured that Boris was probably grateful for at least that much even with his emotional distress.

As Kamal finished up the watering, he saw Boris slowly shuffle in, still holding his water cup as best he could. “I needed to...re-pot some off those...” he murmured, more to himself than Kamal.

“Repotting can wait, Boris,” Kamal assured him. “It’s gonna be fine.”

“But...I _neebd_ two...” Even so, Boris went back to the stool to finish his water, and Kamal followed him to take care of that police call.

Boris was incredibly out of it. He couldn’t really pinpoint what Kamal was saying to the police, everything felt fuzzy. Everything felt, looked, and sounded fuzzy. His eyes couldn’t focus on anything, at least anything but the flowers all over the shop floor. Some of them still looked fairly undamaged, with roots still on. He could fix them, at least. He made his way over to the few that had a chance, grabbed one of the unbroken pots, and placed it in haphazardly. The cup of water was apparently enough to rehydrate his tears, because they started flowing all over again. “T-heyre gonna diiieeee...” he sobbed. “Their gonana dye and _I failed themn..._ ”

He felt a familiar comforting hand on his back. He turned to look and saw Kamal, apparently having finished the call and now rubbing his back in a soothing manner. "It's gonna be okay, Boris,” he said softly. “I think they’ll live. They’ll be fine.” Unable to think of any response, Boris settled for gently putting the pot on the floor and turning Kamal's back rub into a full-on hug.

Only a few minutes had passed before the police had arrived. They were only alerted to their presence by the door opening and one of the officers announcing themselves, the squad car sirens apparently not having been turned on due to it being the aftermath of an incident rather than an active emergency. As the officers approached them, one of them carelessly stepped on an errant rosebud and Boris flinched in Kamal's arms. “Morning, gentlemen,” the other officer said, showing them his badge and his partner following suit. “I’m Officer Darren, this is my partner Officer Michel. Mind telling us what happened here, as far as you’re aware?”

“Yeah, I think I should do that,” Kamal said. “I honestly know less of what happened but my husband’s not exactly in the most talkative state of mind at the moment.” He was admittedly uncomfortable with having the police around—growing up in New York will do that to you, let alone other factors—but any other options would likely end with them getting involved somehow anyway. Better they be there to hopefully help out. “Someone broke in, probably overnight, we don’t know exactly when or how many but we’ve got cameras so they must’ve caught something,” he explained. “All I know is that Boris pulled up to start work and found everything like this, except for the blood, that happened later. Everything else was like this when he got here, the window and door broken, all these flowers and pots destroyed, and the cash register completely gone.” Boris grimaced at hearing this. He’d been so distraught over his flowers that he hadn’t even noticed the register was missing. Add that to the pile of terrible things that happened this morning, at least that was only a few hundred dollars that could easily be replaced...

“So how do you explain the blood?” Officer Michel asked, examining the long trail smeared along the floor. “Was there some sort of confrontation here, you reckon? Did the suspect return?”

“No, that was Boris on his own," Kamal said. “He hurt his hands pretty badly...”

Officer Darren approached Boris cautiously. “You injured yourself, sir?” he asked, and Boris nodded. “Can you tell me how this happened?” Boris was having trouble finding his words again, so he just motioned to the multitude of glass and ceramic shards littering the floor, several of which were in the blood as well. “I...see.”

“Well, if you’ve got cameras, we should check the footage.” Officer Michel looked around, taking note of every camera she could see and making a mental map of their likely field of view before turning her attention to Boris. “You should really get some proper medical attention for those,” she said to him. “I can take you to the hospital while they look at the footage. Would you like me to do that?”

Boris shook his head. “I...wamt to sea...what hap-pened...” Officer Michel nodded, and she and Officer Darren followed Boris and Kamal to the back room where the security footage was kept. As the four of them watched the footage, Boris began to feel a bit “wooz-ish” in his own words. His vision had spots dancing across it on occasion. Probably not a good sign, but he was stubborn and he wanted to know who had done this. And as they watched the somewhat grainy video, it was becoming increasingly clear that he wouldn’t get his answer as soon as he would like. There were clearly two individuals, but any visibly identifiable features were obscured by plain dark-colored clothing and ski masks, one likely black and the other likely that obnoxious fluorescent orange color that hunters had to wear to avoid getting shot at by other hunters. Seeing the actual moment of the rock being thrown in was another emotional stab, or maybe the pain was coming from his hands, but either way Boris had to leave the room at that point.

He didn’t notice that the others were done until he felt Kamal’s hand on his shoulder again. “Well, we have some good news,” Officer Darren said. “We think we have a good chance of catching the guys if we dust this place right now.”

“But...they were ware-ing masks...” Boris said in a bit of a daze.

“Yes, but as far as I can tell from what we saw, they forgot to wear gloves.” Officer Darren smiled. “We’ll dust for prints and see if they match anything we’ve got on file, and then we can...” He trailed off, his attention turning to the gauze on Boris’s hands that was slowly turning a more noticeable red. “Geez, that’s not looking so good,” he muttered. “How deep was that, anyway? You sure you don't need the hospital?”

“I wamt to know who Did this.”

“Sir, even with our potential lucky break here, it’s going to take at least a few days to actually find them and that’s only if we get lucky again," Officer Darren said. “I’m obviously not in the medical field, but that looks like it could bleed out if you don’t get it fixed within the next hour or so.”

“Boris, c’mon, let's let them handle this and get you some help,” Kamal said, gently taking Boris's arm in his hands. “I know you don’t like hospitals, but you need to get that fixed properly.”

“But...but you did so goode, lily!” Boris said, holding out his hands. “Look! You rapped themn up verie well!”

“Not well enough,” Kamal insisted. “Seriously, Boris, those cuts were way too deep and if you don’t get them looked at soon you might never be able to garden again.” It was probably hyperbole, but if that’s what it took to get Boris moving then that was what he would have to do. Thankfully it worked, as Boris finally allowed him to lead him out to his car.

Unfortunately, what neither of them were expecting was that the local news crew had already descended upon the scene. Cameras and microphones were shoved in their faces as they passed through, with Boris trying his best to shield his face from view and Kamal shouting for them to get away. He managed to get Boris into his car, making sure the doors were locked and the window open no more than a crack so that none of the camera vultures could get to him, and quickly darted to the pay phone so as not to disturb the investigation.

“ _Yello?_ ” the sleepy voice of an old friend answered once he’d placed the call.

“Yeah, Wallus, it’s Kamal,” he said. “Could you do me and Boris a big favor later today? Can you pick Putunia up from school?”

“ _Uh, sure thing,_ ” Wallus said. “ _What’s going on? You sound kinda shaken..._ ”

“It's Boris’s shop,” Kamal explained. “Someone broke in last night and wrecked the place, and Boris hurt himself while trying to clean up the mess. I’m taking him to the hospital and I have _no_ idea how long this is gonna take, so I need to make sure Tunes isn’t stuck stranded at school for hours...”

“ _Oh god..._ ” Wallus muttered. “ _Yeah, yeah, I’ll take care of that. I’ll go ahead and set my alarm for it. Uh...send him my best, I guess._ ”

“I will. Thanks a bunch, pal.”

As he hung up the phone and made his way back to his car, he could see a young woman trying to talk to Boris through the window. A young woman with a press badge. “Like hell you’re bothering him now,” he muttered under his breath as he picked up the pace. “Hey! HEY! Leave him alone!” Kamal shouted at the woman, who was startled by his sudden presence. “We said no questions, go away! He’s going to the hospital, he doesn’t need your crap right now!” He managed to make the woman back away from the car and, once he got in himself, drove off at a faster speed than usual. If they got a ticket, they could cover it. Boris needed help _now_ , and he was going to get it as soon as possible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ohhhh boy, angst time. Big ol’ angst time. Time to suffer. Angst isn’t usually my thing but once the events that kick off and those that will be coming in this story got lodged in my brain, I just had to solidify them more. Though if anyone knows me, a good ending is pretty much guaranteed, it’s just gonna take wading through quite a bit of sad times to get there.
> 
> I’d like to thank Tavros (Pollyannam3) for helping me a lot with this! Even though they used the metaphor of them laying out ingredients while I put together a delicious cake, I consider this as much their baby as it is mine. Hell, I think they were the one to suggest the original idea in the first place, I’d have to look back on the chatlog part of my notes on this to be sure... _(and also as a reminder, the neutral presence of fictional police here do not reflect either of our views of the police in real life, black lives matter and cops are clowns—wait, no, that’s an insult to clowns)_


	2. Second Opinions

When Holly Stargazer first applied for the local news channel’s internship position, she had assumed she would be assisting with actual reports, or setting up equipment, or anything remotely useful to actual news coverage. Instead, she was basically the designated coffee runner for the actual news crew. It felt somewhat degrading, but at least this internship was a paid one so it’s not like she could really complain _that_ much. It still allowed her press clearance, so that was a plus.

Holly had been riding out to the scene of a robbery with the main reporter, and as they were getting closer and closer she began to recognize the surroundings. She’d been in this area several times throughout her life, but the most recent visit was to check out the newly opened flower shop. That flower shop that was owned by one of her younger sibling’s new friends, that doctor guy who ran that weird Habitat place before it closed down last year shortly after its opening. She tried not to let it show in her conversation with the reporter, but she was getting a sinking pit in her stomach. She really hoped what she thought happened wasn’t true...

Unfortunately, the thing she was worried about was exactly what had happened. God, the damage to the flower shop looked way worse than she could’ve imagined. Who the hell would _do_ something like this? Before she could ponder this further, she had a paper listing off three coffee orders pushed into her hand along with some cash and was being nudged toward the nearby cafe. She sighed, resigning herself to her duties. Vanilla latte, caramel macchiato, iced frappe. She also had enough money on hand to get herself a mocha, so why the hell not.

Once she returned with the coffees, her attention was grabbed by the absolute wreck of a man walking out of the ruined shop, guided by a shorter man in a doctor’s coat holding his arm and being understandably snappy at the news crew. Yup, that was the guy, Habit or something similar. She wanted to see if both of them were okay, especially the big guy, but she was quickly wrapped up in getting the “important” people their oh-so-important coffees. She understood news reporting having to remain neutral while trying to get as much info as possible, but geez, it was like no one else here _cared_ about the guy whose damn shop was practically destroyed. Couldn’t any of them see he didn’t want to be bothered right now?

Well, if no one else was gonna care, she might as well do it herself. Once his doctor husband had gotten him into their car and ran over to the pay phone, Holly cautiously made her way to the car with her coffee in hand. She lightly knocked on the cracked-open passenger window, though even that was enough to cause Habit jump a bit. “Mister Habit?” she asked with concern. Habit turned to look at her, and _god_ was he a mess all over. His hair was partially out of its ponytail and seriously frazzled, there were some blood smears on his shirt, and he had clearly been crying a lot as his eyes looked very red and there were dark tear tracks running down his cheeks. “Um, I dunno if you remember me, I’m Cosmos’s sister. Are, uh, are you gonna be okay? You want my coffee? You look like you could use it, no offense...” She held up her mocha, hoping it was something he’d like. He didn’t respond, just staring off in her general direction.

“Hey! HEY! Leave him alone!”

“Augh!” The sudden shouting nearly caused Holly to drop the mocha, and considering it was still pretty hot that would've been disastrous for either her or Habit if it’d spilled and got on her or through the window and onto him. Thankfully she caught it just in time to see Habit’s husband storming over, clearly angry at what he likely believed to be another intrusive reporter. “Sorry, I just thought—”

“We said no questions, go away!” he shouted, shooing her away from the car. “He’s going to the hospital, he doesn’t need your crap right now!” Once she’d moved a safe distance away, the doctor got into the driver’s side of the car and sped off.

“Hospital?” Holly cringed. That explained the blood, at least. She really hoped that whatever had happened, they’d get there in time to take care of it...

\-----

Dallas had been spending a lot of time at Parsley’s apartment lately, not that either of them were complaining about the arrangement. He had the place to himself whenever Parsley was at work, and as one would expect of an artist like himself he used the time alone to get his own works of art done. That encounter with the flower kid had really reignited his passion for art, reminded him that he had no need to obsess over a clearly disinterested person as a sort of “muse”, and that the real source of inspiration was in himself the whole time. Now that he was taking regular commissions again, the only issues he had were unruly clients and the occasional interruption of his boyfriend’s little troublemaker.

He was prepping a canvas for a new piece when he saw it. He had the TV turned on while doing so, and had muted it due to not wanting to hear the commercials. Coating the canvas in a healthy layer of Klein blue and humming to himself while doing so, Dallas only vaguely caught the flash of a familiar face out of the corner of his eye. That artist’s eye of his honed in on that, of course, and he paused in his work out of confusion and concern. “Whoa, hang on,” he thought aloud, “what’s Habit doing on TV?” He began searching for the remote to unmute the broadcast, though based on the headline “LOCAL FLOWER SHOP ROBBED” along the bottom, he could guess it wouldn’t be anything pleasant.

“— _metime between 6 PM yesterday and 9 AM this morning, according to the owners of nearby businesses who witnessed nothing suspicious within that period. A police investigation is currently underway with the help of surveillance footage captured by cameras that the victim had installed._ ”

“Oh god...” Dallas sat down on the couch, staring in disbelief as the camera panned over to Habit again. He looked awful, like his spirit was as shattered as the window behind him. “Dude, what’d they _do_ to you...”

Suddenly the camera approached Habit closer, and he was startled and raised a hand to shield his face. God, those bandages looked almost completely red! What had even _happened_ to him?! “ _Mister Habit! Mister Habit, a few questions please!_ ” a reporter exclaimed as they drew closer to him.

“Not cool, dude...”

At that moment, the door to the apartment unlocked and Parsley pushed his way in, bags bearing a local restaurant’s logo in hand. “I’ve got salad and pasta!” he exclaimed. “And today’s a slow day at the office, so no one’ll mind if my lunch break taking a bit longer too!” He took a pause when he saw Dallas’s expression, one of disbelief and an uncharacteristic hint of anger. “What’s wrong, danish?” he asked. “If you wanted something else I would've gotten it, but you _did_ say surprise me...”

“No, man, nothing wrong with the grub,” Dallas said. He directed Parsley’s attention to the TV, where the broadcast was still focused on Habit’s flower shop. “Poor guy didn’t deserve this...”

“Oh god...”

“They tried to record and talk to Habit too,” Dallas said, “and he was not lookin’ hot at aaalllll. Looked ready to just shatter into a million pieces.”

Parsley scowled just thinking about it. “Media morons need to take some step back.”

\-----

“Who would have the _gall_ to do such a thing...”

Trencil stared aghast at the footage. He had initially only turned on the television to have some background noise while he made himself a late breakfast before returning to his writing, but he now found himself looking upon the utter devastation of Habit’s flower shop. He had been to visit a few times, only natural as both a friend and a fellow floral enthusiast, and seeing it in this state was nearly heartbreaking. While the news crew were not being allowed inside the shop, he could imagine that the interior was just as trashed as the exterior. And if he felt the metaphorical pit in his stomach, he could only imagine how the man himself must be feeling.

And speak of the devil, he and Kamal were now walking out the door. Habit did indeed look worse than he’d imagined, and Kamal was guiding him along while trying to shoo away the news crew. “ _Mister Habit, just a minute!_ ” a reporter called out, approaching him with a camera following close behind. “ _A few questions please, Mister Habit!_ ”

Trencil glared at the TV, unable to believe someone could be so insensitive even in the pursuit of truthful information. He could feel himself baring his fangs on instinct, even though the target of his aggression was both unseen and separated from him in reality by miles and however much time between when the footage had originally been captured and that present moment. “Gabber-clowns like yourself had better back off before someone—”

“ _No comment, back away!_ ” the on-screen Kamal shouted. He got in between Habit and the camera, blocking him from view and trying his best to obscure the camera by nearly placing his hand on the lens before the camera itself backed away.

“...yells at you." His sympathetic aggression faded, returning to the feeling of general concern. “Well, at least he won’t have to deal with this alone,” Trencil said to himself. He made a mental note to send some flowers, though he would be sure to wait until the sting of this travesty would likely not be quite as sharp.

\-----

“ _It appears that the shop’s proprietor is in a state of distress due to this incident, however he and the friend that left the scene with him declined to comment on the situation._ ”

“Of course he’s upset!” Mirphy shouted at the TV, rising from her seat in a righteous rage. “And that’s his _husband_ , you idiots!”

“Mirphy, please, try to calm down,” Tiff said in a more hushed tone. “We’re in public. You could be disturbing other customers.”

Mirphy groaned, but nonetheless sat back down. She and a few other women from the Habitat were having a girl’s day, and it was supposed to be a relaxing outing with lunch and some shopping and maybe a few photo shoots, but hearing about this kind of put a pin in the group's mood. Seeing the guy partly responsible for bringing them together like that was just _awful_ , and from the looks on Tiff, Lulia, and Jerafina’s faces, she could tell they felt the same.

“Oh, I just hope everything turns out all right,” Lulia said with a worried frown. “No one deserves to have something like that happen to them.”

“Don’t wooorry, Lulu, he’ll be fiiiiiine,” Jerafina said, taking a sip of her drink (soda, thankfully, as she had promised to make this girl’s day a sober one). “Yeah, seems like he’s taking things hard right now, but he’s got Kamal to help him get through everything! Those two are reeeaaal good for each other, Habit’s gonna get through this real good with his support network.”

“I sure hope you’re right about that...”

\-----

Medical settings always made Boris uncomfortable. His comfort zone was firmly rooted (no pun intended) in plants and soil, the warmth of nature. It was a stark contrast to most doctor's offices and hospitals where, despite the best efforts to make things inviting, the building would always be just too cold and the surroundings too sterile. His past trauma and the years he'd spent working an unwanted job in a different branch of the medical field certainly didn't help. This feeling was much worse in the waiting room of the ER, not to mention actively losing blood through the deteriorating bandages wrapped around his hands.

Everything was starting to be too much. The buzzing and subtly flickering lights overhead, the chemical smell of disinfectant from where someone else had either vomited or rapidly lost a lot of blood on the other side of the room, it was all overwhelming. Not thinking about the current situation, Boris began to gently flap his hands a bit to try and channel the overstimulation out of his system. He only stopped when there was a light tug on his sleeve. "Hey, Boris, maybe that's not such a good idea right now," Kamal said with a nervous smile. "You know I support you stimming when you need to but...y'know, hands? The reason we're here?"

"Oh...right..." Boris put his hands in his lap and tried to ignore the Everything around him, but it wasn't working very well. He decided to instead try bouncing his leg, and that did seem to help a bit, especially with the addition of his shoes doing that click-click-click against the tile that he usually enjoyed so much. Soon enough, however, his energy was giving out and he couldn't keep up the leg bounce despite very much needing to.

“Boris Habit?”

Boris looked up hearing his name, and he saw a doctor with a clipboard waving him into the main part of the hospital. He shakily stood up, with Kamal helping to stabilize him, and they followed the doctor into an examination room. The doctor introduced himself as Dr. Terrance, then motioned for Boris to sit down and after a bit of getting settled he held out his hands and allowed Dr. Terrance to see the bright red bandages. “So, care to explain what happened?” Dr. Terrance asked as he went about carefully unwrapping Boris's hands. He couldn’t bear thinking about that morning’s events again, and instead began to sob again. “That bad, huh?” Dr. Terrance asked, and Boris responded with only a nod. “Think your friend can tell me so you don’t have to?” Another nod. Boris was too tired to correct him on the exact status on his and Kamal’s relationship.

“There was a break-in at the shop my husband—Boris, I mean—works at,” Kamal explained. “He was trying to clean up the mess, and he grabbed onto some glass and the pieces got shoved through his hands.” He winced looking at the uncovered wounds again. _God_ , they looked so deep...it’s a wonder there wasn’t any bone showing through. “He works at a flower shop, so there’s probably dirt in there along with glass pieces...”

“Yeah, that could pose a problem,” Dr. Terrance said. “Lucky you guys got here when you did. Would hate for something this big to get infected.” He saw that Boris was starting to cry again, so he tried to lighten the mood a little. “You know, this one here kind of makes it look like you have a pinky ring half-way,” he said with a bit of a laugh. Boris didn’t laugh though, which he figured he should’ve expected. “Well, we’re going to have to give the larger wounds some stitches, but once we get all of these cleaned out I think the smaller ones will be good with some surgical glue.”

“But...wouldn’t gloo ‘b’ Bad...?" Boris asked tiredly.

“Don't worry,” Dr. Terrance said, “it’s not the same as craft glue.”

“Womder if it’s purble, like what Putunia has in her school bagg...”

“It’s kind of purple,” Dr. Terrance said with a smile. “A bit closer to blue, in my opinion.”

“Putunia...really really really likes the purble stuff...” Boris laughed, still in a bit of a weird daze. “Some-times...she rubs the regular gloo...all over her ‘hands’...then she lets it dry n peels it all off...”

It wasn’t too long before Boris’s wounds were being cleaned up. The cool water running over each laceration felt soothing on its own, but the movement from the tiny glass and dirt particles being washed away absolutely did not. It was all Boris could do to not either clench his teeth or scream into the doctor’s ear from the pain. After the cleaning, Dr. Terrance started applying some glue to the smaller cuts and Boris couldn’t hold in the emotions anymore. “Am I...am, am I goign to havvto close the store _for-evber??_ ” he sobbed.

“Honey, no, of course not,” Kamal said soothingly. “It’s just for a little while, no need to panic.”

“If I have two be a dent-est again Ime goning to...Sc ream...”

“Of _course_ not. Never again.”

Once the smaller cuts were dealt with, Dr. Terrance brought over a syringe filled with some sort of local anesthetic. He took Boris’s right hand, definitely the worst off and therefore most urgent of the two, and carefully injected the anesthetic around the wounds. Boris was still crying, and not being able to wipe the tears from his eyes was bothering him even more. “Ime sorrey for...fore being such a babey,” he said through his tears. “I’m just...I domt like ‘blood’...or nee-dles...or...or doctors...Ime 38, whym I so dumb abbout this...”

“Hey, it’s gonna be all right,” Dr. Terrance said. “You wouldn’t believe how many people around your age I’ve treated who have similar anxieties.”

“If it makes you feel any better,” Kamal said, gently squeezing Boris’s shoulder, “I’m dumb about staircases and stairwells.”

Boris shook his head. “No your Not,” he insisted.

“Exactly.” Kamal smiled, not taking his hand away from Boris’s shoulder as Dr, Terrance began to apply the stitches proper. Boris winced every time the needle pierced his skin, likely more out of instinct than actual pain at this point, but it was enough for Kamal to be a bit concerned. “How are you holding up?” he asked.

“...p okey,” Boris said.

Sooner than expected, all the lacerations on his right hand had been closed and Dr. Terrance put the suture supplies down on a tray he had on the nearby desk. “All right, we’re done with that,” he said. “Let’s just get that hand wrapped up real quick...”

“Oh, thank _god_ that’s over with,” Boris breathed a heavy sigh of relief.

“...and then we can get started on the other hand.”

Boris grimaced, his relief deflating when he’d realized he’d completely forgotten about the other hand’s injuries. Once his hand was wrapped the process was repeated with the other hand, thankfully taking considerably less time given that hand’s injuries weren’t nearly as bad. With both hands stitched and wrapped, they were given a prescription for a brief course of precautionary antibiotics (in case some bacteria was still present in Boris’s wounds even after washing them out) and aftercare instructions before being sent on their way.

Kamal helped Boris back into his car, who looked absolutely drained from all of this, not to mention he could barely grab the door handle with the continued numbness in his hands. “It’s still only the afternoon and I bet you’re already wanting to turn in, huh,” he said as he got into the driver's seat.

Boris gave a light nod. “I want to turn inn...for-ever...” he murmured.

“No...” Kamal shook his head as he started the car. “Turning in forever would be awful, Boris. If you did that, then who would sell flowers and make everyone happy?”

“Cos-mos’s momther.”

Kamal sighed. “Well then...who would do all that and also be my husband?” Boris cracked a small smile, the first bit of happiness Kamal had understandably seen from him since they’d both left for work that morning. “We should probably get going, huh,” he said. “Gotta get the supplies for taking care of that over the next bit. If we’re lucky we’ll have everything and be home before Putunia so she doesn’t have to wait for us too long.”

“Putunia...” Boris said. “She’s...still-at schoole...you can go ‘get’ her, I might be abel to be aloan for that long at least...”

“Absolutely not, I’m not leaving you alone in the state you’re in,” Kamal insisted. “Look, I already called Wallus before we left the shop. He’s gonna pick her up, don’t worry.”

“Oh.” It seemed like Boris was able to relax a tiny bit from that statement. “Wallus is so sew good,” he sighed. “He’s two goode after whamt I did to himn...” Kamal decided not to comment on that statement, not knowing what he could say that would either make him feel better or at least not make him feel worse. He decided instead to just give Boris’s shoulder a small comforting squeeze before putting his hand back on the steering will and driving out of the hospital’s parking lot.

\-----

The buses had already left and Putunia stood outside of her school, a little confused. Today was a day Dad would be picking her up, right? Both he and Pops were really good about being on time, or at least not making her wait too long after the buses were gone. Yet here she was, standing there among the other children getting picked up by their parents and the small number of teachers who stuck around to watch them. She grabbed at the straps of her backpack and her mind couldn’t help but wander and wonder as to why Dad was taking so long. Traffic, maybe? Did Godzilla stomp on his car while he wasn’t looking? Maybe some aliens kidnapped him and made him work on their teeth. She hoped not, for both his sake and theirs, because if anyone had taken her family they were gonna get it!

“Hey, kiddo,” a familiar voice said as she was imagining all that. Putunia looked up to see, not Dad or Pops, but their friend with the mop hair. “Surprised to see someone you weren’t expecting, huh?”

“Mister Wallus?” Putunia asked. “Where’s Dad? He said it was his turn to pick me up today.”

Wallus hesitated with his answer. Truth be told, he didn’t know if it was his place to say. Well, she was going to find out eventually, so he figured he should at least make sure these random kids and teachers didn’t hear about it at the same time. “I’ll tell you in the car, okay?” he said. “Right now I gotta make sure the teachers know I’m allowed to pick you up.”

“Okay,” Putunia said with a nod. She waited by bouncing on her heels while Wallus confirmed his emergency pickup status with the teacher, and after that was sorted out she took his hand as he led her to his car. It was fairly large like the one her pops drove, though clearly older with a few spots of rust in places. She hopped into the front passenger seat after Wallus unlocked the door. “So where’s Dad?” she asked again.

“Your dad is, well...” Wallus struggled for a way to tell this to her. She was just a kid, after all, and he may have taken on the role of a father recently himself but his kid spent most of his time elsewhere with one of his friends so in his mind he still didn’t have much experience with children when it came to conversation. “Your dad took your pops to the hospital earlier, and they might still be there.”

"The hospital?” Putunia asked, now genuinely worried. “Did Pops have an appointment or something?”

“No, it was an accident,” Wallus said. “Some bad guys broke into your pops’ store, and he hurt himself pretty badly when he was trying to clean up. He’s gonna be okay, though. Your dad’s getting him taken care of, and those bad guys aren’t going to get away with it.” As he started the car, he noticed Putunia had gone strangely quiet. “You okay, kid?” he asked before turning to look at her. He could see that her hands were balled up into little fists, and she looked _furious_. “Putunia?”

“Those bad guys are gonna pay,” Putunia said.

“That's right,” Wallus said. “The police are gonna find ‘em, don’t you worry.”

As Wallus drove away, Putunia couldn’t help but say what was on her mind, even if it was at a volume that he couldn’t hear. “Not if I find ‘em first.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Boris has people thinking about him in his time of need, even if he’s not necessarily aware of it just yet. Probably didn’t need that coffee at the moment, so it might be a good thing that Kamal chased Holly off when he did. And yes, if you remember the off-hand mention of Holly in Removing the Rose’s Thorns, that is indeed my flower kid’s sister. Figured that’d make sense as a more natural way for Cosmos to learn about this, as they don’t strike me as the type to watch the news and they’d be in school during all this anyway. And I dunno about people older than me, but I don’t remember any of my high school classes playing same-day news broadcasts at all. Only news broadcast I remember seeing during my entire school time was in 2001 and...well, yeah.
> 
> Fun fact, I was originally gonna have this chapter be entirely outside perspectives, mainly because I hadn’t figured out how many I wanted to show and therefore had no idea how long this chapter would be as a result. I ended up wanting the next chapter to focus on them at home and the evening of trying to return to some sort of calm after everything, so the hospital scene ended up fitting here and not making things drag. Real glad that worked out as I’m not sure how far I could’ve taken the “all the Habiticians react to the news of Habit’s break-in” angle, and as much as I like extra detail sometimes less is more y’know?


	3. Winding Down

“We’re home, Boris.”

Boris looked up from his hands, which he had been staring at during most of the drive. Sure enough, they were home just as Kamal said, and the familiar setting was simultaneously comforting and worrisome. Mostly worrisome for the potential state of his flowers. If someone would break into his store and destroy the flowers there, who was to say they wouldn’t find where he lives and come after the ones here too? Or worse, hurt his family? And even if they didn’t, he could hardly give them their proper care in the state he was in...

“Boris?” Kamal asked. “Are you doing okay? Or, better at least?”

“M’just...worryed...” Boris murmured. He looked down at his hands again, examining his new relatively clean wrappings. “These band-ages...” he said. “It feels like Ime a box-er...”

Kamal put a gentle hand on his shoulder. “You’re strong like one, y’know,” he said with a smile. Boris just looked at him, only having the faintest hint of an expression on his face. A look of absolute despair behind tired eyes. “We should probably go inside,” he said. “Get settled down, let Wallus know he’s free to leave, all that.”

“Yeah...”

His hands still lacking any decent amount of feeling from the anesthetic injections, Boris waited until Kamal had gotten out of the car and made his way around to open the door. He was a bit shaky stepping out, but his legs were starting to feel less like jelly by now. Probably due to him no longer actively losing blood. As he followed Kamal to the house and waited for him to unlock the door, he felt like his head was clearing up a bit as well aside from the funk of his emotion. Though that wasn’t to say his mind was completely clear just yet, as he was easily startled by the small human form colliding with and wrapping around his leg. “Ah, wha—?” He looked down and saw Putunia clinging to him. “Oh, hel-lo daisy,” he said softly. “How was...how was ‘school’?”

“Pooooppps!” Putunia shouted, clinging tighter to his leg. “Pops, are you okay?! Did the bad guys hurt you??”

“Oh...” Boris put a hand on Putunia's head and gently patted, or at least as gently as he could estimate given his lack of feeling. “They did, yes,” he said. “They hurt me grately.”

Putunia looked up at him, her eyes narrowing. “I’m gonna fight ‘em for ya, Pops!” she shouted. “I’ll kick their butts! And throw things at ‘em!”

“Daisy, _nooo_...”

The three of them entered the house, both Boris and Putunia disappointed that he couldn’t pick her up and carry her like she liked. Wallus was sitting on the couch, trying to keep an excited Webster from barreling into them. “About time you guys got home,” he said with a dry laugh. “Putunia’s been going on nonstop about the latest Mask Driver and I was worried she was going to run out of material.”

“Glad to hear she wasn’t any trouble,” Kamal said. “Thanks for helping out on such short notice.”

“No trouble at all,” Wallus said with a tired smile. “She’s a good kid, and it’s the least I can do for a pal. That and I feel real bad for Habit, too...I know me and him are still kinda on shaky ground a bit, but no one deserves this...”

“Yeah, I’m just hopin’ this whole thing doesn’t make him feel like he has to quit flowers again,” Kamal sighed. “Well, guess you should head home, huh. Would you be willing to help me get Boris’s car tomorrow morning?”

“Sure, no problem.” Wallus gave Kamal a light hug before heading out, and he motioned to give Boris an amicable handshake before remembering that wasn’t entirely feasible at the moment. “Um...take care, Boris,” he said. “Get well soon and all that.”

“Okey...”

Wallus took his leave and Boris slumped into his former place on the couch. With no one holding him back, Webster leapt onto the couch at his larger dad’s side, at least as best he could fit on the other half of the couch given his own very large size. He started to sniff Boris all over, smelling all the weird medical smells with an energetic curiosity. Boris sighed heavily, lightly stroking the dog on his head and neck. It was so surreal, trying to pet Webster with little to no feeling in his hands. He was reminded of his weird thoughts from earlier while Kamal had been getting his antibiotics. He’d asked himself repeatedly how he was going to do any normal day-to-day necessities while his hands were like this. How was he going to hold utensils to eat, or brush his teeth? How was he going to shower or wash his hands after doing his business without ruining the bandages? How was he going to perform...pretty much every method he had for coping with bad things like this? Everything he could think of that eased his mind aside from his medication and unhealthy things involved his hands in some way. The only saving grace to that part of things was that he didn’t have to worry about his house plants dying. He could trust their maintenance to Kamal. He wasn’t much of a gardener, true, but he was good at following instructions and cared enough about Boris and his interests to help if asked.

Webster let out a sad whine, clearly disappointed with the quality of Boris's petting. “Ime sorrey, Webby...” Boris said softly. “I’m sorry I can’t give you the goode pets. All I can do is pet gemtle...and I camt even ‘feel’ it...” Of course Webster didn’t understand. He just put his head on Boris’s lap and gave him the classic sad dog eyes, and if Boris hadn’t already cried out all the tears his body was willing to make in the past couple hours he would probably start crying again.

Kamal tapped Boris on the shoulder to get his attention, holding out an already opened snack cake for him. “Think you’re in an okay spot for sweets?” he asked with a soft smile.

“I...I think sow...yes...” Boris gingerly took the cake, trying both to get a good hold on it and to keep Webster from getting to it and potentially getting sick from chocolate poisoning.

“Figured since you didn’t eat lunch today and it’s getting closer to dinner time, you should at least have a snack,” Kamal said. He had two identical cakes for himself and Putunia, one of which was already half-eaten. In truth it was the first thing he’d eaten all day, but he didn’t regret it. Boris’s safety had to come first in that moment.

“Thank-you, lily...” Boris shoved the cake into his mouth rather quickly for obvious dog-shaped reasons, and it honestly did help him feel a little better. He hadn’t realized how hungry he’d been from missing lunch, and emotionally speaking chocolate just seemed to have a cheering quality to it. Maybe that was why dog boy kept trying to risk his life for a bite. Once he’d finished he handed Kamal the wrapper. “I just remembrered,” he said, “I was going two make ‘fish’ to-night.”

“I think we’re gonna have to put that plan on hold,” Kamal said. “I’ll call for takeout, that sound good to you?”

“Yes,” Boris sighed. Webster left to investigate some random sound only his dog ears could pick up, leaving a puddle of drool on Boris’s pants which he awkwardly tried to wipe off with his elbow. “Speeking of fish...have you sean Willow?”

“Sulking in the cat tree since we got home,” Kamal said, motioning to the cat tree in question. Willow was still kind of small so it was hard to see her, but sure enough her tail was slightly sticking out over the edge of one level and twitching slightly.

“I wamt to pet her too,” Boris said, “but I probaly smell weirb from the hopspital...”

“And she’s still kinda warming up to us, too...” Kamal sighed, then ate the rest of his cake as he gave Putunia hers. “I’m gonna call in some takeout, make dinner easier on us after the day we’ve had,” he said. “Chinese sound good to you?”

“Itse fine...”

“I want extra egg rolls!” Putunia shouted. It seemed they were all in agreement, so Kamal went to place the call while Putunia jumped up onto the couch after Webster chased after his smaller dad. She devoured her cake, and once she was finished she leaned onto Boris’s side. “So Pops, you got stitches, right?” she asked, curious but still trying to be as considerate as a kid her age could be. “Can I see ‘em?” Boris shrugged, not really caring enough to see any problem from that. He unwrapped his left hand first, as best he could with obvious complications, and then his right. Putunia stared at them with a mix of awe and anger. “I’m gonna fight whoever gave you new battle scars,” she said. She then pointed to the longest one, on his right hand. “Why’s this one the biggest?”

“I crawled back-wards intwo a big shard of glass,” Boris said. No reason not to tell her the truth, and as long as he didn’t get into too much gory detail it would be fine to tell her about this.

Putunia made a little face of disgust, and then set about looking over the rest of the wounds. “Y’know, with the two smaller ones here, this big one looks like a smiley face!” she exclaimed. “And on this hand it looks like it could be a heard if it had extra loops!”

Boris couldn’t help but laugh a little. His little hero really was a sweetheart outside of their pretend games. “Okey daisy, I have too wrap these up agen,” he said, taking his hands away from hers. “I’m sorrey, I camt have them ex-posed for too long.”

“It’s okay, Pops!” Putunia said with a smile. “You gotta take care of yourself! And if you need me for anything, I’m here!” Boris returned her smile with a sad one of his own. If he hadn’t cried himself out all day, this little girl’s sincerity would make him start up the tears all over again.

\-----

It didn’t take too long for their takeout dinner to arrive, and even though it was just Kamal setting everything out for obvious reasons that didn’t take too long either. He’d ordered chop suey for himself just to try something new, Putunia got kung pao chicken (how in the _world_ did a kid her age tolerate that spice? or did she just power through it because the name sounded superhero-y?), and he had figured that Boris would like something familiar and comforting given everything that had happened so he’d ordered his usual house lo mein. And, of course, there were extra egg rolls.

As the three of them sat down to eat, Boris noticed that something was different about his plate compared to Kamal’s and Putunia’s. “Wait...did they not give me chop-sticks?” he asked, confused as he tried to pick up the fork sat beside his plate.

“They did, but umm...I figured using a fork would be easier on you,” Kamal said. “Y’know, all things considered.”

“...makes cents...” Boris didn’t want to admit it, but he was having enough trouble just picking up that fork. He managed to do it eventually, and he was genuinely proud of himself until he almost dropped it again.

There wasn’t much conversation at the table, as Boris and Kamal were both pretty drained and most of what Putunia was saying was to exclaim how hot her chicken was. Boris was barely eating his noodles, and Kamal had a feeling it was due to more than just his current hand difficulties. “So, uh...are you gonna eat that or just poke it into submission?” Kamal asked, trying to keep his tone light-hearted. Boris didn’t respond, just continuing to prod at his plate. “Please eat your food, hon, I’m worried about you.”

“My hands r still so num...” Boris murmured. “Itse weird...”

“Well, the doctor _did_ say it could last up to eight hours,” Kamal reminded him. Boris was about to respond, however he was cut off by the phone ringing. “You want me to get that?” Kamal asked, and Boris nodded. He got up and answered the phone, the caller ID displaying a somewhat familiar number. “Hello?”

“ _Hey, Kamal,_ ” the caller said in that seemingly permanent state of exhaustion that could only be Parsley. “ _Is everything okay with you guys? Me and danish—er, Dallas—we saw the news about Habit’s place and we just wanted to check in..._ ”

“Well, things have calmed down a bit, at least,” Kamal told him. “Boris got some pretty bad injuries though, and we got ‘em looked at and taken care of but healing’s still gonna take a while. Physically and mentally.”

“ _That’s a shame,_ ” Parsley said. “ _Give Habit my best regards, okay? And if there’s anything I can do for you guys, you let me know. Especially if the guys behind this are caught and you press charges, I’ll go pro bono on this._ ”

“Will do. Thanks a bunch, I’ll call back when I can.”

Kamal hung up the phone and went to sit back down. “Who was that, Dad?” Putunia asked between mouthfuls of chicken.

“That was Parsley,” Kamal said. “He was checking up on us, wanted to ask how Pops was doing. Also offered to help make the bad guys pay for what they did after they’re found.”

“Parmsley’s a good,” Boris said, a hint of a smile on his face. “He is very verey good.” He put his fork down in a position that he figured he would be able to easily pick it back up from, having managed to get some food into his mouth even with his numb hands, and decided to have his fortune cookie early. “I could use a good for-tune rite now...” he murmured to himself. It was thankfully already out of its little wrapper and easier to break than manipulating the fork had been, though almost as soon as he’d pulled the strip of paper out he wished he hadn’t. He flicked the paper across the table with a groan, choosing to stuff the cookie into his mouth rather than comment on it. Kamal took a look at his fortune, and he could understand why Boris would react that way to a fortune that said “ _a new opportunity will crash through your window_ ” at this moment...

After a while of trying to manipulate the fork again with varying degrees of success, Boris decided he didn’t actually have that much of an appetite to feel like putting up with that was worth it. He stood up and shuffled back to the couch, where he sat and sulked. Kamal frowned, obviously concerned, and went about putting Boris’s noodles back into the take-out container so that he could still eat it when he felt better about doing so. He took Putunia’s relatively clean plate as she handed it to him before running upstairs to play, and once he had taken care of both that and his own plate he joined Boris on the couch. “Hey, Boris,” he said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “Things are gonna be okay. I promise they will, we’ll get through this together.”

“You domt ‘know’ that,” Boris said in an uncharacteristic monotone. “It might nev-er be okay ever again.”

“It _will_ ,” Kamal repeated. “I know when things get bad like this it seems like it’s just gonna stay bad, but it really is gonna get better.”

Boris groaned, letting himself sink deeper into the couch cushions. “Ime so _stupid_...” he murmured. “I should of k-nown that I’m not allow-ed to be hapby...”

“Boriiiis...” Kamal cuddled up close and put his arms around him, rubbing his shoulder. “C’mon, Boris,” he said soothingly. “You’re more than allowed to be happy, you’re _encouraged_ to be happy. This is just a little bad luck. And I’m here for you, and we’re gonna get through this.”

\-----

The phone was ringing again. Fifth time this evening. Boris understood that everyone that had called was concerned for his well-being, and he really did appreciate them, but it was beginning to be a bit much. Every “how are you doing” and “let us know if you need anything” and “I’m so sorry this happened” (that one was the worst, as the incident hadn't been any of their fault) was both appreciated and weighing heavy on him.

He gingerly picked up the phone as best he could. "Hel-lo...?” he answered weakly.

“ _Good evening, Boris,_ ” Trencil greeted him from the other end of the line. “ _My condolences for today’s events. I do hope your evening is faring with some improvement, given the circumstances._ ”

“Oh, hello Trencil,” Boris sighed. “Too be honest, it’s not much better...Ime not bleed-ing amnymore, at least. Still very, very frowny.”

“ _I suppose that's to be expected,_ ” Trencil said. “ _It must have been quite devastating, having to experience all of that. You’ve likely heard this from others before by now, but if there is anything you need do not hesitate to ask._ ”

“I appreshiate that.”

“ _Hold on a minute, Nat and Trevor wanted to talk to you as well, give me a minute to call them ove—_ ”

Boris hung up without another word. As much as he appreciated everyone’s support, he didn't know if he could handle any more, especially not from children. He unplugged the phone from its jack, and made his way upstairs to do the same with the cordless phone. “Hon, what are you...?” Kamal started to ask, but he stopped himself as he realized it was very obvious what he was doing.

“I thimk...I want two go to bed earlie,” Boris said.

“Okay,” Kamal said. “I’ll, um...I’ll join you soon, then. G’night.”

Boris didn’t respond. He just shuffled into their room and turned the light off. Didn’t even seem like he was brushing his teeth before bed like usual, and honestly Kamal could understand. The whole day had shaken up any sense of routine for him, one more missed routine wasn't too out of the realm of possibility.

“Is Pops gonna be sad forever?” Putunia asked, briefly looking up from her coloring.

“No, just for a while,” Kamal told her. “I’m sure it’ll be fine. This is just a really big thing to get over. He’s gonna need a lot of help, though, and he’s gotta have time to feel his feelings too.”

“I’ll help him a lot,” Putunia said. “I already have an idea!”

“Just don’t get too rowdy with him just yet, okay?”

Putunia nodded, then returned to her coloring while humming. A half hour or so later, it was time for Putunia to go to bed as well. Kamal helped her get ready for bed, and with nothing better in mind to do with his time he decided to turn in early as well. After brushing his teeth and getting into his pajamas, he made his way to bed and looked at the large form of Boris laying there, asleep but clearly not having the best time of it. He moved over to his side of the bed and climbed in, putting a hand on Boris’s arm once he was in. “Good night, Boris,” he whispered. There was a sound of sheets rustling, and one of Boris’s bandaged-wrapped hands reached up to touch his.

Kamal was glad that even in his sleep, Boris could recognize his comforting touch. They were going to get through this situation, and he would be there for him the whole time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A slightly shorter, more subdued chapter this time. Not really much to say here, I think the story text speaks for itself this time. Well, I can say this at least: we’re getting into some _real heavy_ sads next time, and I’m gonna preemptively warn you about some likely disturbing imagery in the first bit of that. And dream-flashback appearance of...someone unpleasant...


	4. Can't Find the Words

He held the pot lovingly in his arms. At long last, he’d gotten the tooth lily he’d been looking after to reach full bloom. It made him so happy, and maybe it would finally make them happy for once too. He kept telling himself that as he heard angry shouts through the door, calling a name he no longer felt was his own.

“Whatse that, lily?” he asked, holding up his ear to the flower. “You wamt one more kissie before I let you meet them? Hehe, okay!” He held the lily close and puckered his lips...

_**SLAM!** _

The door burst open and the imposing form of a man entered, silhouetted by the hall light in such a way that his features were mostly obscured in shadow save for a menacing grin and a malevolent glint in his eye. “D... _dad...?_ ”

“Listen here, you little brat!” his father shouted. “Next time I call for you, you’d better damn well answer me!”

His father effortlessly swatted the lily out of his hands, letting it fall to the ground and shatter on the floor. He made a move for the boy next. Confused and scared, he raised his arms to try and shield himself from the blow that he could see coming—but his hands were no longer there, all that remained were bloodied stumps at his wrists—

And then Boris woke up.

He knew immediately that he was no longer in the same state as he was in the dream. For one, he could see a tooth lily on his night stand, whole and intact and far away both in space and time from that situation and that meant he was far away as well. For another, even if he hadn’t brought them up to his face to see that they were indeed still there, he could definitely feel his hands now. And they hurt something _fierce_. They hurt a lot worse than they had when they had been sliced open, probably due to all those little needle pokes from the stitching, and the stitching itself pulling at the skin...god, the pain was _so bad!_ He couldn’t help himself and started crying out from the pain. He heard the other side of the bed creaking and the sheets rustling, but he couldn’t take his attention away from his hands, which felt like they were on fire.

The burning sensation...maybe cold water would help ease it. He got out of bed and unwrapped his bandages as best he could, then made his way to the nearby bathroom. Once at the sink, he turned on the cold water at full blast and just held his hands under the stream. The cool stream rushing down his palms was helping a little, but not nearly enough.

“Boris...?”

Boris turned to see a very groggy Kamal standing at the door. Immediately he felt extremely awkward. Here he was, basically drowning his hands in the middle of the night, and he really couldn’t think of a way to explain it. And now he didn’t know if he could properly turn the faucet off by himself with his elbow like how he'd turned it on. Thankfully it seemed like Kamal could understand from what little context he had, as he sluggishly made his way over and turned the faucet off for him before grabbing the nearby hand towel. “Cold water help any?” he asked as he gently patted his hands dry. Boris nodded briefly, before transitioning to shaking his head. “Okay,” Kamal said. “I think they gave us some painkillers, I’ll go get you some and maybe that’ll work better.”

“ _I’m sorry I woke you._ ” That was what Boris had wanted to say, and his mouth made the movements for the “ _I’m sorry I_ ” part before he realized he wasn’t making any sound. This wasn’t good. Kind of hard to sign with his hands in such a state...

Kamal frowned with concern. “Oh boy, you lost your words again, huh...” Boris nodded, looking down at his hands again. “And you probably can't sign right now, can you?” He shook his head, probably more fervently than he meant to. “All right, I’ll get you those painkillers,” Kamal said, “and if your words don’t come back in the morning I’ll stick to yes-or-no stuff. Will that help?” Another light nod and a sad smile. Kamal gently hugged Boris before making his way toward the kitchen.

Even in his still sleepy mindset, Kamal made sure to have caution as he descended the stairs. You have _one_ stair mishap as a kid and it sticks with you, no matter how out of it you are. He switched on the light, wincing at its brightness, and grabbed the painkillers off of the counter. He turned around to grab a glass and nearly jumped when he saw that Boris was right behind him. “Geez, you are _too_ stealthy for someone your size sometimes,” he gasped. “Um, you can go back to bed if you want, I was coming back up real soon.”

Boris pointed at the glasses in the cabinet. “Oh, you wanted a drink?” Kamal asked, and Boris nodded. “Okay, soda’s probably bad for right now, so you want water or juice?” He realized almost as soon as he had finish asking that Boris wasn’t going to be able to respond, so he held up two fingers of his free hand. “Touch one for water, two for juice I guess.” Boris tapped a single finger with his own, and Kamal filled a glass from the tap and sat it down. “We should probably get those wrapped back up while we’re thinking about it,” he said, and Boris held out his hands for him to do just that. Thankfully it didn’t take too long, and Kamal even added a kiss to each one when they were done.

Soon enough they had both returned to bed. The painkillers were already starting to take effect, and apparently one of their side effects was making the user sleepy because Boris was feeling the need for sleep overcome him again. Or maybe it was that he’d been forced awake way too early by nightmares and pain. Maybe things would be better in the morning.

\-----

Things were, of course, not much better in the morning. Boris’s hands were hurting again, though thankfully not quite as much as they had been in order to intrude on his dreams and wake him. His emotions were still in a funk, understandable given everything that had happened in the past 24 hours. And his speech hadn’t returned, not even after Kamal and Putunia had left and he was the only person in the house. Usually when he lost his words for prolonged periods like this, he would recover after some alone time. This was apparently not going to be one of those times. And he didn’t know how the pets would react to their big dad being temporarily unable to speak, so _that_ was going to be fun to figure out.

Even though his hands hurt a lot, he could at least feel them again, so as long as he was careful he could do some more things than he could the previous night. Gardening, drawing, and all of that were still very much off the table, but he at least felt a little confident in handling things that didn’t require nearly as much complex dexterity like a fork and the television remote. So since he was actually feeling okay to eat now, he reheated his meal from last night (and had to deal with not being able to properly tell Webster he couldn’t have any as he stared expectantly at him the whole time) and then moved to the couch to take in some passive entertainment.

Boris didn’t want to watch actual TV as he felt it would have the likelihood of showing the news footage capturing his situation, so instead he put in a tape that Putunia had checked out from the library earlier in the week. It was one of those neat little educational tapes that took place in some virtual museum, and it always captivated Putunia to the point where it was the few things that could encourage her to sit still for at least half an hour. This one was about dogs. Dogs were good and wholesome, and wolves were good as well even if their nature as wild animals meant they were decidedly less wholesome out of necessity. Surely that would help soothe his emotions at least a little bit. That’s what he thought, at least, until he got to the part mentioning police dogs, which reminded him of the ongoing police search for the robbers, and that of course reminded him of the whole incident overall...

He had to stop the tape early, rewinding it out of courtesy for either Putunia or whoever would check it out next. Well, that was a wash. At least he was able to give Webster some better pets than last night, though not much better. Maybe internet was worth a try. He at least remembered to plug the phones back in before trying to get online. After recovering from the grating dialup noise making him cringe, Boris opened up his email, and there were a few unread messages in there. Two were from a couple days ago, three of them seemed to be more messages about those single ladies looking for love (he really did hope they found it, he knew from experience that sort of thing takes time), and one had been sent just last night. And he recognized the address right away, and he figured it was someone he really needed to hear from right now.

_**To:** Hab_B@PedalMail.cob  
_ _**From:** palebloomdot@PedalMail.cob  
_ _**Subject:** Checking in on you_

_Hey Boris. Mom told me about what happened at your store. I hope you’re doing okay, at least as much as possible. Are you doing okay? I hope I’m not bothering you with this, I can understand if you’d want to be left alone for a while. Mom tried to call you last night and couldn’t connect, I guess you need some space and after something like that it makes sense. If there’s anything I can do to help in the meantime, feel free to let me know. And if that’s giving you space to feel your emotions and only have close family nearby, I can respect that._

_My condolences for everything, hope they catch the people responsible and I’m sending good vibes your way. Don’t know if that’d help, but it probably helps to know people are thinking about you at least. :-)_

— _FK_

He couldn’t help but smile after reading that. While he had appreciated everyone wanting to call in to offer support and sympathy the previous night, having it in text felt less overwhelming. And at present, it would be the only outreach that he could respond to either way. And since he was here anyway, he figured he would take the time to do just that.

_**To:** palebloomdot@PedalMail.cob  
_ _ **From:** Hab_B@PedalMail.cob  
_ __ **Subject:** RE: Checking in on you

_Thamk yuo for youre massege i M donig bett er then iwas yseterdaay but notm uch bet ter,. Veru frowlie adn hand s hurrt frmo glas cutes.,,. Stiches aer not funn. Plea ase domt get stitcehs they arre “ba d”. Aslo i losrt my worbds so ifyuo camn le tev-rymone know ab out tahtt sow thye wati 2 calm id aprehsiatit. I wil probaly clall pepole wenh i can tlakl agen thamk you som uhc. Youra goob frenid amd I loev you as a frenb an tel-yor momther Iam bokay thakn yuo._

— _Borsi_

It took him a lot longer than he would’ve liked to write that, having to pause every few words to let the twinging pain in his hands settle down. He was sure there were way more typos than his usual writing too, as his sharp fingers tended to hit keys weird anyway, but then again he never bothered correcting himself unless absolutely necessary so it probably wouldn’t be _too_ noticeable. Would it? Oh, who was he kidding, it was _super_ noticeable. He misspelled his own _name_ , even. He sent the email anyway as it was, hoping that Cosmos would understand his reluctance to try and proofread in that moment.

There wasn’t much else he wanted to do on the internet at the moment, so he decided to disconnect. There also wasn’t much he wanted to or even could do offline, as everything he thought of was either too hand-intensive or would remind him of yesterday in some manner. Everything, that is, except maybe take a nap. It would pass the time without him having to sit around alone with his thoughts, at least. He considered trying to coax one of the pets to bed to share the nap, but Webster was already banned from the human beds and he didn’t want to risk rolling over onto Willow and squashing her. No one would enjoy that...

\-----

Kamal’s mind was back at home the whole time he was at work. Even as he saw patients and set up appointments, he couldn’t help but think about how Boris was doing. His focus was only half-there as he took a call that partially interrupted his thoughts. “Bora-Keally Dentistry, Dr. Bora speaking,” he said in a distracted tone.

“ _Paging Dr. Bora, this is also Dr. Bora speaking!_ ”

He couldn’t help but laugh at that, as he knew that voice all too well and was used to her jokes along those lines. “Hey Kanti,” Kamal said. “What’s going on?”

“ _Ohhh, nothing much,_ ” Kanti said in that “something awesome is definitely going on” tone. “ _It’s just a little change in the family, no big deal.”_

“What kind of change in the family?” Kamal suddenly became concerned. He was already on-edge about stuff going on here, if anything happened back east...what would he even be able to do?

“ _I just kinda...maybe...might’ve...stolen a cat._ ”

“Stolen a _cat?_ ”

“ _Hey, in my defense, they brought him in and wanted him declawed,_ ” Kanti said. “ _Declawed, Kam! They wanted to cut off his little toes! Technically speaking, they surrendered him once I gave them a talking-to, I just made the decision to not have him sent to a shelter. It just sounds cooler to say I stole him. Oh, and you’re gonna love him when you visit next, Cadbury’s so so good!_ ”

“I’m just glad you won’t be getting in trouble,” Kamal sighed.

“ _Okay, what’s wrong over there?_ ” Kanti asked. “ _I tried to call you about this last night and the line was friggin’ dead, something’s up and I don’t think it was just phone problems. You know you can’t hide anything from me so don’t even bother._ ”

“It’s Boris,” Kamal said. “Someone broke into his shop early yesterday morning, and he’s been a wreck ever since. I don’t blame him for feelin’ that way, of course, I’m just really worried about him in this state...” There was a brief moment of silence from the other end. “Kanti? You still there?”

“ _I’m gonna have to let you go, I need to check JFK and see if they have any last-minute openings._ ”

JFK? Why would Kanti be calling the— “You don’t need to do that,” Kamal insisted. “Just stay there, the police are already looking into this.”

“ _All the more reason for me to get over there!_ ” Kanti half-shouted. “ _The hell are the cops gonna do?! Sit around with their thumbs up their asses at best?!_ ”

“Look, I _know_ how you feel, but think about what Boris needs,” Kamal said. “He needs time to recover from this, both physically and emotionally. You suddenly showing up to play vigilante won’t help, just send him an email or something letting him know you’re thinking about him, he’ll at least appreciate that.”

“ _Wait, physically? What do you mean physically?!_ ”

“He sliced his hands open while cleaning up the mess. The culprits hurt his heart, but his injuries were a complete accident.”

“ _I...see._ ” Kanti sighed. “ _Fine, I get it. I’m no good with sensitive stuff anyway, so if anything I’d probably make things worse._ ”

“Kanti, that’s not what I meant,” Kamal said. “I just don’t think Boris is in the mindset to think about how justice is gonna be served, whether it’s the legal kind or otherwise. Besides, you are good with sensitive stuff. Like cats. Didn’t you just say you got a new one? He needs his mom around so he can bond and learn the rules of the house properly, right?”

“ _That’s true, Caddy does need to get used to everything,_ ” Kanti said. “ _Well, uh...call me back when things start getting better. Or whenever, really. I know the long distance piles up, but it’s still more than worth the extra charges to hear from ya._ ”

“The feeling’s mutual. Love ya, talk to ya soon.”

“ _Back atcha, you big nerd._ ”

\-----

That evening was pretty mellow, at least as mellow things could be given everything that had happened in the previous 48 hours. Boris had been in bed since before Kamal and Putunia had returned home, and they had both tried to coax him out of bed in their own ways with little success. It was about time for dinner, and due to Boris’s wrecked emotional state Kamal figured some comfort food was in order. Putunia had even been allowed to help prepare the food (well, more asked than allowed as this _did_ need another set of hands, but phrasing it like she was doing a huge favor always made getting her to do chores and otherwise helping out much easier). “Well, that should do it,” Kamal said once they’d finished putting everything together. “Looks good and smells better. Let’s go see if Pops wants to help us find out how it tastes, all right?”

“Yeah!” Putunia exclaimed. She ran over to the stairs and slowed down long enough to ascend before breaking into a sprint again, and Kamal was close behind at a much more reasonable pace. She burst into the dads’ bedroom very loudly, startling Boris and causing him to roll over to see what had made the noise. “Pops! Poooops!” she shouted. “Dinner’s ready! We made chicken and dumplings!!”

Boris barely managed to muster a sad smile, still in a bad funk that was partially brought on by having let himself stew in his thoughts the past few hours. That was pretty much all the response he gave, however, as he pulled the covers back close to his head. “Boris?” Kamal asked. “Honey, you wanna come downstairs to eat?” No response. Not that Kamal was expecting anything verbal just yet, but a nod or wave would’ve been helpful or at least less worrying. “C’mon, Boris, I know it’s a food you like,” Kamal said, putting a comforting hand on Boris's shoulder. “Tunes even helped make it like a big girl, isn’t that right?”

“Yeah!” Putunia exclaimed. “And! I’m gonna pick a good show for us to watch while we’re eating!” Still no response from Boris, so Putunia made her way around to the other side of the bed and climbed up into it. Pops was gonna get some love cuddles for his sad times!

“C’mon, Tunes, don’t get comfy right now,” Kamal said. “We’re trying to get him _out_ of bed, remember?” Putunia groaned and climbed back out of the bed, while Boris had little reaction except for moving his hand a little bit to where she had been sitting. “Why don't you go back downstairs and start getting your food?” he asked. “I’ll make sure Pops is okay, don’t worry.”

“Okay,” Putunia said. She ran out of the room, and from what Kamal could tell she slowed briefly for her descent. At least she was paying attention to stair safety rules, if only a little.

Kamal moved over to the side of the bed he usually occupied, putting his hand gently on Boris’s. The way he had turned back over had let his unmanaged hair pretty much cover his entire face aside from a little bit of his mouth. “You feeling even a little bit better?” Kamal asked. All he got was a shrug. “Yeah, I getcha, things are really tough right now...” He held out his fingers, like he had done that morning. "How’s the pain doing?” he asked. “Uh, left is least pain, right is most.” Boris hesitated, then gently tapped his middle finger. “Okay, so it could be better...emotional pain?” Three quick taps to the rightmost finger. “Yeah...yeah, that’s kinda what I expected...”

He gently brushed his fingers through Boris’s hair, which looked oddly darker in this lighting than it normally did for some reason. “You think you’re gonna be able to come down for dinner?” he asked. Boris lightly shook his head, grimacing a little. “Would you be up to eating if I brought it up here?” A pause, and Boris nodded. “All right, then,” Kamal said. “I’ll go get one of the tv trays and bring you up a plate real quick—”

Kamal let out a gasp. He had brushed some hair away from Boris’s eyes, and underneath he could see why other parts of his hair had seemed to turn darker. It had been a long time since he’d seen this side of Boris, at least in the physical world outside of photographs. The upper half of his face was covered in shadow—no, was shifting into a shadowy form—and all he could see of his eyes were glowing red pinpricks. The shadow had wormed its way through his hair as well, and now that he was actively looking for it he could see other shadowy patches; the tips of his fingers, a splotch on the bits of his chest was visible, his whole upper right arm underneath the sleeve as far as he could tell... “Oh, _Boris_...” he said breathlessly. “I had no idea it was this bad...”

Boris peered up at Kamal, his shadow spreading down his face and turning his mouth into little more than a blue outline. He winced a bit from what Kamal could only assume was some sort of discomfort. “...s...tat...ick...” he managed to say hoarsely in a voice that hadn’t been used since the previous night, and from the sound of it that single word took more effort than most full sentences.

“Static?” Kamal asked. “You mean like that weird feeling from when your foot falls asleep?” Boris nodded, and Kamal wasn’t going to make him talk more if even a single word was too hard for him at the moment. “I’m sorry I can’t really help with that,” he said. “I’m gonna go get your food and be right back, don’t worry.” He gently rubbed Boris's shoulder, which felt weirdly fuzzy as the shadow had spread to that part at this point, and made his way back down to the kitchen. He had just grabbed a tv tray and was about to fix Boris a plate when he heard a loud thud from upstairs. A cold chill came over him as his anxiety started coming up with all kinds of things that could’ve just happened.

Kamal rushed back up the stairs, his worry for his husband outweighing his deep-seated trauma in that moment. He burst into their bedroom and...nothing. Boris was gone, leaving behind an empty bed with the sheets in a position that implied something had rolled off the side from underneath them. But that was impossible, wasn’t it? The door to the bathroom was open and no one was inside, so it wasn’t like he’d just gone to the bathroom for whatever reason. How did he leave so quickly?

He stepped further into the room to see if he could figure out what was going on. As he examined the room, whenever he passed by Boris’s side of the bed he felt something brushing against his foot. Willow must’ve followed him in, he assumed, curious about what was happening in here as well. She could do without messing with his legs though, made it hard to move around. After another brush he knew he had to put a stop to this before he fell. “All right, Willow, that’s enough,” he said with a sigh. “Time for you to leave the—” He looked down to see that it wasn’t actually the cat. It was Boris. He’d rolled out of the bed like Kamal had assumed, but he wasn’t just _on_ the floor. He was _in_ the floor. He’d become just as two-dimensional as the shadows of the bed and other furniture and himself. “Boris, oh god!” he shouted. “How— _why_ —??”

Boris didn’t make any attempt to respond, just curling up into a ball as best someone of his size could. The way he was at the moment made it appear like he was levitating over the bed, and if the situation wasn’t so dire Kamal would've probably found the image humorous. “Is, um, is this helping you feel better at all?” he asked, trying to sound calmer to not escalate things. Boris shook his head, and Kamal was grateful that this form of him still had his facial features so he could see this easier. “Do you wanna get out?” A nod this time. “Do you need help with that?” A pause, then another nod. “Okay then, lemme just...figure out how to do this...”

Kamal knelt down on the floor and put his hand against it, as close to Boris as he could manage. Boris slowly moved his hand close to Kamal’s and tried to grab it. It took a few tries, but soon enough his shadowy hand rose out of the threads of the carpet and back into the third dimension, wrapping around Kamal’s wrist. Kamal would have been totally willing to throw out his back trying to help him out, but luckily he didn’t need to as it appeared Boris just needed that bit of grounding to help get himself out the rest of the way. He was still completely coated in shadow, but at least he wasn’t a carpet dweller anymore.

“So...I’m gonna assume you’re not in the mood to eat at the moment, huh?” Kamal asked. Boris nodded sadly, curling back into a ball again. “That’s okay,” Kamal said, gently rubbing his back. “Your food’s gonna get cold, but that’s what microwaves are for. And I can stay here with you if you need me. You want me to do that?” Another nod, and Boris motioned to the blankets still on the bed. Kamal didn’t even need to ask. He pulled one of them off and placed it on Boris, wrapping it around him to help him feel comfortable. He then laid down himself, placing his back against Boris’s for extra comfort.

Boris felt like he was going to cry again, but not completely from sadness this time. He felt so much love in that moment. He was so lucky to have someone that cared so much about him...

Something light in color moved into his range of vision. It didn’t take too long to identify the something as Willow, likely having come in to investigate why there wasn’t food in her dish yet. Boris wondered why Webster hadn’t checked on them, but then again there _was_ fresh warm food downstairs and he was probably too preoccupied with trying to get Putunia to share. Willow gently sniffed at Boris’s face. She didn’t seem spooked, so maybe his current appearance didn’t bother her. That or he still smelled normal, it’s not like he actively smelled himself when this happened to him.

When she was done with her sniff, she let out a soft meow. She wandered over to where Boris’s legs were and, much to his surprise, started kneading her paws into the blanket near his feet. He gasped lightly, as Willow had yet to express much real affection beyond mere tolerance for anyone in the house by this point. After she’d gotten her fill of kneading, she climbed on top of both of them and got comfy in the small space between, tucking her legs underneath her body into a loaf shape. God, this cat. This cat had just blessed him in one of his lowest points. His cat and his husband, as well as his daughter and dog even though they weren’t present in the room at the moment, his entire new family was just so, _so_ good.

After a while, he could feel that static sensation starting to fade away. He pulled one of his hands out of the blanket wrapping and looked at it, watching the shadow recede and reveal more of his normal self. His hands still twinged with pain and felt somewhat stiff in their movement, though they weren’t staticky or coated in shadow so it was an improvement at least. Boris slowly moved into an upright sitting position, feeling bad when his movement disturbed Willow, but as he tried to apologize he confirmed his suspicion that his words still had yet to return to him properly. Once he sat up, he gently nudged Kamal to get his attention. “Looks like you’re getting back to normal somewhat,” Kamal said with a smile. “You feelin’ a little better?”

Boris nodded lightly. He was then startled by a low grumbling sound. He didn’t have to wonder what it was, because he felt his innards move a little bit as his stomach growled. He probably would’ve laughed if he could. Instead he decided to try his luck with some simple sign, as even though his hands still hurt and had difficulty with small movements he could at least feel and move them. “ _Food?_ ”

Kamal nodded. “It shouldn’t take too long to reheat, after all,” he said as he stood up. “Let’s just hope Webster hasn’t stolen it all.”

Boris smiled, then shakily got to his feet himself. “ _Thank you._ ”

“You don’t have to thank me,” Kamal insisted. “I love you, and I’m here for you whenever and however you need me. Honest.”

Before Kamal could leave the room, Boris gently pulled him into a soft hug. Kamal happily reciprocated, letting his taller husband rest his head upon his own and his pained hands lightly stroke his back. They didn’t need words in that moment, even if full conversation were possible. Their love and care for each other spoke for itself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Been putting Art Fight as my top priority (well, aside from basic biological needs, my part of house maintenance, and personal communication) for the past couple weeks, so that’s why this took a bit longer than the previous updates hehe. Future updates are gonna be similarly spaced out, at least until August then depending on my drive it’ll be going back to normal update speed :3c Decided to reference Smile For Today with the email addresses like with...something else I’m working on in the background, though Cosmos has a different one from the one given to FK in that little epilogue because I wanted to personalize them more. Hopefully someone gets the reference, hehe.
> 
> Also those educational tapes like the one Boris watches were absolutely a real thing, they were called Eyewitness and they were based on a book series and I loved them so friggin much as a kid! And the first season was definitely around in the same timeframe as this story, I definitely looked that up when considering putting that in here and also? I found out? That they’re all officially uploaded on Youtube??? I can send you guys a link to the channel per request, though be warned that a lot of them probably contain outdated information because it _is_ from the mid-to-late 90s and several thumbnails show off common phobias that are subjects in the videos (insects/spiders, reptiles, internals of human bodies ie. skeletons and muscles and such for anatomy study purposed, weird ocean stuff, etc) so if there’s anything specific you’d like me to warn you about wrt that I’ll do my best to help with that! Though keep in mind the only episode I’ve watched in the past 15-20 years at present is the one about dogs (hence why I knew about the scenes with wolves eating a kill and police dogs), so detailed warnings beyond thumbnail warnings might be out of the realm of possibility, hehehe...


	5. Voice By Proxy

Another unwillingly quiet day alone at home. At least it was a Friday and tomorrow he’d have human company for most of the day again. And this time Boris had found a video that he knew was relatively easygoing and wouldn’t actively remind him of the event he was currently recovering from even with its own big sad moment, so he could at least enjoy some TV time. Still, watching the cartoon lion cubs dancing on screen did little to distract Boris from how unbelievably sick of his own silence and _bored_ he was. The song about the main cub’s dreams of his future role as leader only barely drowned out his thoughts about the past couple days, and not being able to at least doodle was making focusing his mind on anything other than that hard anyway. Well, at least it was entertaining in the moment.

As the movie went on, Boris started thinking more about the current state of his hands. They were still in pain, still stiff in movement, but after the events of last night they seemed much less pained at the very least. Weird things did tend to happen to his body after he came out of shadow form, after all, whether he’d done so voluntarily or not. Sometimes he got sick or dizzy afterward, a few times he had felt weirdly extra-lovey for no real reason (his appreciation for Kamal’s support didn’t count, that actually was a real and valid reason), so who was to say it couldn’t speed up the healing process of his injuries? Well, in any case, now that his hands hurt less he decided to try something he’d been meaning to since his stitches had first been applied...

He made his way over to the shelf where he kept his puppet likeness. Even though Kamal and Putunia were still a little wary of him (and to be fair he didn’t blame them, puppet fears were valid especially when that puppet would be used for really creepy PSAs in a failed “mental health” retreat), he always tried to at least greet the little guy. The puppet had felt strangely alive ever since shortly after he had finished making him, and his tendency to move under his own volition after a few months only cemented that. Boris gently picked Lil Habby up off the shelf, something that he clearly welcomed given his grabby-hands gesturing as he approached. He gingerly slipped his hand through the sleeve and into his head, letting both himself and the puppet get comfortable. Once they were settled, he couldn’t help but examine Lil Habby’s tiny felt hands. Even with the matching thread he’d used to minimize the visibility, he could see little extra hand stitching where he had needed to fix the hands a few times in the past. Just like his own. He remembered how bad _he’d_ felt at the hospital two days ago. Was that how Lil Habby felt every time he had to sew him up? He couldn’t help but feel just _awful_ at that...

“Yuo domt haf-2 worrie abbout Me, Big Habit, it tdosentt hurbt ‘me’ at all!”

Boris really shouldn’t have been that surprised. He’d often had conversations with his puppet without actually knowing the response that would be given, and he was fairly certain that he could remember at least one occasion where it had spoken while he could not. Perhaps he just wasn’t expecting to hear his own voice in that moment, having gotten used to the relative silence. Either way, it did lift his spirits a little to hear a version of himself again.

“Soh-ow comme yuo havenent spendt timne with Me with all-this goign ‘on’?” Lil Habby asked, gently patting Boris’s free hand with his own. Boris frowned, and Lil Habby gave a little nod. “Two hurt-y, eye ‘C’, that mak-es cents.” He gave Boris’s free arm a small hug. “Ev-rythinmg will ‘B’ o-kay, domt worrie,” Lil Habby said reassuringly. “You havbe ‘flamily’, and yuo have ‘friemds’, and U habve Me!” He patted Boris’s face with his little hand, a newly formed tear running down from his eye and being absorbed by the felt material. “Adn I canne hlelp inn my own weigh,” he added. “I’ll B yuor ‘voice’ as loooong as u nee-d, bokay?”

It was all Boris could do to nod while wiping his tears away, a small smile forming on his face as well. He knew that Kamal and Putunia might find this temporary solution to his words problem a bit unusual, but he hoped they would understand it was better than his constant silent frustration.

\-----

Kamal let out an exhausted sigh as he and Putunia entered the house. Even though he had been able to focus more on work today, his mind had floated back to Boris’s situation while he wasn’t occupied and that anxiety had still been very taxing. “We’re hoooome...” he called out as he was locking the door behind them.

“Welc-lome ‘back’!!”

Kamal’s attention perked up. He’d missed that voice so bad, even if it was just a couple days since he’d last heard him speak with such ease. “Pops is talking again!” Putunia exclaimed. “Pops! You’re okay!!”

“Ummnm...not qu-ite, hehe...” Boris made himself visible, including the puppet on his arm, and both of them gave Kamal and Putunia a friendly wave. “Hel-looo, everlybobdy,” Lil Habby said. “Simce Big Habbit can ‘us e’ me agen, we dee-sided I coulb h-elp him with talk-king untill he can due it himslelf!” His mouth opened up to give the impression of a goofy grin, and Boris had a bit of a nervous smile on his actual face. He was trying to gauge their reactions to this. Please, he thought to himself without giving his puppet permission to pass it on, please don’t be upset...

Putunia glared at the puppet with suspicion for an uncomfortable few seconds. “You’d better be nice,” she finally said, pointing at the puppet in an accusing manner. “If you’re talking for Pops, you better only say what he _actually_ wants to say. Got it?”

“Ohhh, itse no worreys, babey,” Lil Habby chuckled. “I woulb _neeeever_ put wrong ‘words’ in Big Habit’s mouf!” Boris moved his arm closer to Putunia so the puppet could pat her head, which she thankfully allowed.

“I’m just glad you managed to find a solution for this that works,” Kamal said, albeit with a bit of a nervous laugh. _God_ , that thing was creepy, especially the way it would act on its own, but if it helped Boris in a tough time then he was gonna tough out those feelings too. “So, uh...who should I be addressing during this?” he asked. “Cuz I remember last time something like this happened you preferred I talk to the puppet...”

Boris and Lil Habby glanced at each other, considering the question for a bit. “Ummmmmm, Big Habit wamnts u 2 tlalk too ‘him’,” the puppet said, and Boris nodded to confirm that.

“All right. Just wanted to make sure.”

Kamal held his arms out for a hug, and Boris gladly accepted the offer. “I lovbe yuo so so so muchKam-al,” Lil Habby said, and Kamal could see Boris's smile out of the corner of his eye. “ _Soooooo_ munch, U and Putunia bofth.”

“I love you too,” Kamal said.

\-----

Later that evening, around a dinner consisting of last night's leftovers and some small salads (which Putunia tried her best to _not_ have, but she eventually compromised with eating at least one bite of it), Boris was having difficulties again for a completely different and much larger reason than the night of the initial incident. Due to his new temporary solution to the problem of lost words, he had insisted on bring Lil Habby to the table so he could join in on potential conversation, which gave him one fewer free hand to use for eating. It was noticeably more usable of course, even with the occasional jolts of residual pain, but it was still only one and it was clear that Boris had not thought this through all the way.

“Boris, honey, you know you can just take your hand out of the puppet and put it back in when you want to say something, right?” Kamal asked while watching Boris struggle with wrangling an errant dumpling onto a fork one-handed.

“Itse 2 tea-dee-ous,” Lil Habby insisted, and Boris nodded as he finally decided to stop trying to scoop up the dumpling and pierced it with his fork instead. He smiled upon his success and munched on it, savoring his success.

“Well, whatever works best for you, I guess,” Kamal said with a nervous laugh. He then turned to Putunia. “So, you wanna tell your pops the weird thing that happened at school today?” he asked.

Putunia nodded, her mouth too full to say anything just yet. She tried to swallow her mouthful of food as quick as possible, though doing so nearly had her choking on it. Thankfully she didn’t, and she was able to tell her story. “Okay! So! Short version is, the boys’ bathroom _exploded!_ ”

“Ooooo exs-ploaded??” Lil Habby gasped. "How 'did' t-hat hapnen??”

“Jeremy told me he heard the other boys shoving toys and papers and stuff into all the boys’ toilets,” Putunia explained. “And then! They flushed all the toilets and the whole thing blew up! Water and toy pieces everywhere!! And I think some of the stuff floated back up into the girls' bathroom cuz I went in there and Lisa said she saw a Transformer staring at her from the bowl!” She narrowed her eyes and whispered, “I totally saw it too, it was _definitely_ Bumblebee.”

“O-deer! I hoap ev-ery-onme was O.K.!"

“Yeah, the boys got detention, but no one got hurt,” Putunia said. “It was a biiig mess though! We’re gonna hafta walk all the way around the school to get to the gym now, or else we have to walk around in poo water!” Boris smiled, and Lil Habby let out a small laugh for him.

“All joking about bursting toilets aside, I’m really glad you’ve found a way to get around the talking issue,” Kamal said with a warm smile. “Even if it is unorthodox, hehe. I know that’s been real frustrating for you, along with...well, everything.”

“Thamk-U Kamal!” Boris moved his puppeting hand over to Kamal and let Lil Habby “kiss” his face with an exaggerated “ _mmmwah!_ ” sound. “May-B this will help m e feel bet-ter!”

\-----

“I’m am _Not_ feel-ing aney bepter...”

Boris was sulking on the couch again, his arm that had Lil Habby on it resting on his chest. Putunia was sitting on the floor in front of him, watching cartoons and drawing. Apparently she was trying to draw Boris, as she kept letting out exclamations of surprise and annoyance whenever her crayons went off the page. She always did overestimate her work space when trying to draw him, something that Boris couldn’t really fault her for. People tended to underestimate how large he was in person if he wasn’t right there in their physical presence.

“Are you gonna be like this forever, Pops?” Putunia asked innocently. She looked over at her father and immediately felt bad when she saw his blank expression looking back at her. “...Sorry...”

“Eet’s oh-key, Putunia!” Lil Habby said, patting her head with his little felt hand (she cringed a little, but she tried her best not to let either of them notice). “Thes e thimgs takee ‘thyme’. I wilm ‘B’ fine evan-choo-alley, adn then thinges can go bacl 2 normlal.”

“I’m tryin’ to draw you something to help,” Putunia said. She did her best to keep her attention on Boris and not the puppet, which she figured wouldn’t be rude since he _had_ said he wanted her and Kamal to talk directly to _him_ and not _it_ right? “But you’re so _big!_ ” she exclaimed. “And my paper’s so _small!_ I can’t fit your whole Pops-ness!”

“May-B yuo can taype pappers 2gevther?”

Putunia gasped. “I didn’t think of that!” she exclaimed. “But I don’t have the tape here...”

“We camn get Kam-al too brign sume,” Lil Habby said. Boris held the puppet up as high as he could from his position on the couch, not nearly motivated enough to move from that spot. “Kamaaallll! Can U brimg Putunia some ‘tapee’ pleese? I’m am sti ll sull-king!”

Kamal came into the room soon enough with a tape dispenser in his hand. “Here you go, Tunes,” he said. He placed it on the table and ruffled her hair with his hand. He then turned his attention to Boris, looking at him with concern as he gave him a weak wave with his free hand. “Boris...I know you said you were still sulking, but are you doing any better?” he asked. “Really?”

Boris nodded, not wanting Kamal to worry much more than he already was. Though after a bit he shook his head. “Im juste feal-ing sow Badd all the-time now,” Lil Habby moaned. “Brane foggie, verey frownie, hed-akes and wamting-2 ‘cry’...”

“I mean, it’s been a real rough week for ya,” Kamal said. “Makes sense that you’re still upset after something like that, it’s not the sort of thing that goes away in four days...”

“At-leaste itse Satter-day,” Lil Habby mused. “Amnd yuor Here and Putunia is Hear...”

Saturday... _Saturday_...for some reason, that direct reminder of the day of the week struck something in Kamal’s brain, something that he hadn’t considered until that moment even though he had been home all day so far. “Uh...Boris...” Kamal began cautiously. “I know that you’re going through a rough time right now as it is, but um...when’s the last time you took your meds?”

Boris blinked a few times, surprised at this question. He thought for a bit, looking away, then looking at his puppet as if asking him the same thing. After a while, he glanced back at Kamal and Lil Habby answered, “I dew not...Ree-membrer.”

“You still keep ‘em in the daily container, right?” Kamal asked, and Boris nodded. “Want me to go check?” Another nod, and Kamal gently patted him on his shoulder before making his way to the bathroom where the medicine was kept. He found Boris’s day-labeled medicine container, and sure enough, several days previous still had pills inside. All the way back to Tuesday, even. Boris must have forgotten to take his meds the night before, and that must’ve made the whole thing hit that much harder. And of course he hadn’t even _thought_ to take them the nights after...

All right, new plan. Kamal took the pill container downstairs with him and placed it on the table. “Gonna leave this out here for a while, all right?” he called out. “Might help you remember to take your pills with them visible at mealtime.” He didn’t get an answer from Lil Habby, so he turned to go let Boris know directly. However, he could see that Boris had instead chosen to respond to him with his free hand, holding it up from his position on the couch and giving him a thumbs-up. “All right, then,” Kamal said. “Hope remembering these helps with everything.”

\-----

Sunday came and it seemed like things were starting to improve. Boris was a little less mopey, moving around more and actively approaching Webster and Willow to give them some pets (he still couldn’t pet Webster as fervently as he was used to, but he was getting pets and to a dog that was all that mattered). He was even starting to regain his ability to speak unaided, albeit in the form of single words or very simple phrases. Even though it was small, it was still an improvement, one that everyone in the house appreciated greatly.

“Lily...!” Boris exclaimed as Kamal was almost done putting together lunch. Once he’d gotten Kamal’s attention he held out his arms. “Hug time?”

“Sure thing, lemme just clean this up real quick,” Kamal said. He closed up the containers for the sandwich ingredients and put them in the fridge, then approached Boris and fell into his embrace with a hug of his own.

“Love you,” Boris said. "Love...sow much. So goode...”

“I love you too," Kamal said. “Glad you’re starting to improve.”

“Medesine helped.” Boris gently kissed the top of Kamal’s head and smiled. “And you.”

“Y’know, if you still need to use the puppet for full talking, you can,” Kamal reminded him. “You don’t have to switch completely back to talking on your own if you’re not yet comfortable with that.”

Boris shook his head, trying to keep his smile reassuring. “Tryign two...get bet-ter,” he insisted. “Hand...hurt-ing. Amd...I...wamt...my nor-mal.”

“I know, Boris. I know.”

The rest of the day went along fairly quietly, though it was thankfully not an uncomfortable quiet as the past few days had had. It was a more peaceful quiet, without the feeling that the drop of a pin would tank Boris’s mood all over again. Calm. Serene. At least until the phone rang and broke the calm. Boris had started to get up on instinct, but Kamal made his way to the phone more quickly and answered it instead (and honestly Boris figured that was probably for the best, given he could still barely form full sentences without difficulty). “Hello, Kamal speaking?” he said upon answering, having not paid much attention to the caller ID.

“ _Is this the home of Boris Habit?_ ” a mostly unfamiliar voice on the other end asked.

“This is both our home, yes,” Kamal said. “Can I ask who this is?”

“ _Ah, yes, the husband,_ ” the voice said. “ _Mr. Bora, this is Officer Michel from the incident at Mr. Habit’s shop on Wednesday. I’m calling to inform the two of you that we’ve apprehended the suspects. We’ve reclaimed the stolen equipment as well, that’s actually how we caught them as they were trying to sell it. Unfortunately the cash register’s contents have already been spent, so there’s no recovering that unless the shop was insured properly._ ”

“Oh, uh, thank you very much, that’s great!” Kamal exclaimed. “I mean, uh, shame about the money of course, but I’m sure Boris will be happy to hear the rest.”

“ _No need to thank me, sir, it’s our job,_ ” Officer Michel said. “ _The suspects have confessed to the crime, but they're still set to stand trial should circumstances permit. All we’ll need is confirmation as to whether or not Mr. Habit will be pressing charges before that goes forward._ ”

“Well, I’ll have to talk with him about that,” Kamal said. “He’s been in a real bad mental state since then, and I still dunno if he’d be able to handle all that just yet...”

“ _Understandable,_ ” Officer Michel said. “ _If it helps with his decision, the suspects would be tried regardless. We did arrest them with stolen property on hand, after all._ ”

“Okay. I’ll let him know. Thank you.”

Kamal hung up the phone and returned to the couch. “Soooo, I have some good news,” he said. Boris perked up, giving Kamal his full attention. “They got ‘em," he told him with a grin. “They caught both the guys and got your register back, though it looks like the robbers blew the cash in it.”

“Thatse good...” Boris sighed in relief. “I donot...care...ab-out the monie...”

“I know, hon,” Kamal said. “Should let you know, the cops said that they wanted to know whether or not you wanted to press charges. I feel like that’s your decision to make, so...do you wanna?"

Boris thought for a bit. He _did_ want justice, but at the same time... “If I ‘press’ char-ges,” he eventually said, “do I have to...do I have two go too ‘court’? Do I...hav-to actulaly be their?”

“Honestly, I have no idea. That’d be something we’d have to ask Parsley.” Kamal laughed a little, and that caused Boris to let out a little laugh of his own. “They said they were gonna have a trial anyway, so with my limited legal knowledge—which is just what I got from herb rants—pressing charges would just like...add the psychological damage they did to you or something. Like how this incident made you feel unsafe and, well, all this.”

Boris nodded. “I will com-sider it.” He let out a heavy sigh, smiling wider than he had in the past few days. “I’m juste glad they canmt hurt amnyone else now...”

“Me too.” Kamal sat down on the couch beside Boris and put his arm around him.

“Does this mean you get to fix the shop now?” Putunia asked, having finally turned her attention away from the movie they had been watching.

“Can’t just yet,” Boris said. “I’m still heeling.” He lifted his hands and wiggled his fingers as best he could to prove the point. “Both hear and in my ‘heart’.”

“At least it sounds like you’re doing better with communication,” Kamal said. “Seems like it’s taking less effort to talk for longer periods, anyway.”

“Huh. I did-not notice somhow.” Boris smiled. “May-be just knowing some thing has improoved took a wait off my mind.”

“I’m just glad you’re doing better at all,” Kamal said warmly. He craned his head up and planted a kiss on Boris’s cheek, inevitably leading to Putunia cringing in childish disgust over her dads being mushy again. Neither man could help themselves and started laughing at that.

It seemed as though the worst was over. Now all they had to do was wait for Boris to recover fully, and then everything could go back to normal. As normal as things were for this family, at any rate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things are starting to get better for Boris. Here’s hoping the rest of his recovery goes smoothly now that the main concern is out of the way. The hands are still an problem, after all. Not as bad as they were, of course, but still got the stitches and such.
> 
> This chapter’s dedicated to my buddy Tav (Pollyannam3), who came up with the initial scenario for this fic, helped put together the outline of this whole thing, and without whom this would not exist in any way. They’ve been going through some tough times lately at the time of writing this due to personal reasons, something I don’t feel comfortable detailing here because there wouldn’t be enough room for the full context (not to mention that if it’s anyone’s story to tell, it’s theirs as well as the other friend who was a victim of this same thing, I’m just a bystander with an opinion and at least ten years of life experience on both of ‘em that they can ask advice from), so I’m just gonna say that I’m proud to call them a friend and I’ll be there for them when they need me. And if the other friend and I continue to get to know one another past all this, maybe we can be friends too :3 Or maybe we already are? Idk, I never have any idea when the boundary separating friendly acquaintances from full-on friends gets passed until I and the other person are long past it hehe.


	6. Healing and Distraction

Monday meant that Kamal was going back to work and Putunia was going back to school, and as he wouldn’t be getting back to his normal routine until his injuries had fully healed Boris was home yet again. At least this time he had his speech back, so he could sing as loud as he liked and make one-sided conversation with the pets to break up the monotony. But no matter how many times he asked Webster about his opinion on whether or not they should get new curtains for the living room (his answer was “bork”, a very valid thought on the matter), or tell Willow he appreciated what she had done for him the night he had gone shadow (she responded with a small “mew!” before returning to her scratching post), or enthusiastically join in with one of his favorite artists singing about a journey to witness the biggest ball of twine in Minnesota, one thing refused to change.

He was. Incredibly and utterly. _BORED_.

It still didn’t help things that nearly all his hobbies involved extensive use of his hands, and even though the pain was low enough that he could at least mess around with Lil Habby if he felt like doing so, he wanted to give puppeting a rest for a bit after a couple days of doing so extensively. At least he wasn’t as heavily stuck in that sad fog that he had been, now he was just bored and irritated. He was grateful for Webster’s near-constant presence during the day, anyway. That dopey friendly dog was a nice distraction from thoughts of less healthy coping methods, both in his mannerisms and the nice sensation of his fur under Boris’s fingers.

Boris let out a loud sigh of relief when he heard the door open that afternoon, and decided to meet them at the door. “How was ‘work’ and ‘school’?” he asked once Kamal and Putunia were both in.

"They cleaned up all the toilet water over the weekend,” Putunia said, and for some reason she sounded disappointed about that.

“Thatse...nice?”

“Well, work was pretty much the same old thing for me,” Kamal said. “How were things at home?” Boris sighed heavily again. “Not the best, huh?”

“I’ve just been soooo booooard...” Boris moaned. “Webby and Willow are nice conpanions, butt they have Things to Do as well and I donmt wan-to just sit around amd watch teevee all day, you ‘know’ how I am with haveing to keep busy. I camt even do many cleen-up chores accept picking up the pet toys, and that leeds to playtime of-coarse...”

“Of course,” Kamal echoed. “Well, let’s get Putunia settled and started on her homework, then maybe we can think of something to help with that.”

After they had helped Putunia get started on her homework (thankfully it was mostly just a creative writing assignment for English, where she was allowed to write a single-page story about whatever she wanted, naturally choosing to write about superheroes), Kamal and Boris made their way to the couch to have some adult discussion. “Soooo...what am ‘I’ sup-posed to do all day?” Boris asked. “I’m all eares for any ideas, realley.”

Kamal took a deep breath and sighed. “I dunno how helpful this is gonna be,” he started, “but can I tell you something that happened to me when I was a kid? Something similar to this thing you're going through, but not, like, the same or anything.”

Boris shrugged. “It couldent hurt for me to listen, at least.”

“Okay,” Kamal said. “Well, you know how I’m all nervous around stairs and in stairwells and super-concerned about stair safety? I fell down the stairs while roughhousing when I was nine, backwards, and it was extremely bad. I didn’t break my neck but it was sprained pretty badly, and I think I had a concussion, and after we’d gotten me checked out the recovery was a pain in all senses of the word. Had to wear a neck brace for weeks, couldn’t eat solid stuff properly during most of that time, could barely turn my head without aggravating the pain, and the first few nights I apparently woke up screaming cuz my parents had carried me up to bed and my and Kanti’s room was upstairs until things got switched around for this. It _sucked._ ”

“That _dose_ soumd like a big suck,” Boris said. “Though, I...dont ‘know’ how that’s sup-pose-to help me now...”

“I’m getting to that,” Kamal said, putting his hand on Boris’s shoulder in a reassuring manner. “What happened during this time is that anything that I couldn’t do for a while, my family found ways to help out. I couldn’t eat very well, so my parents and grandma helped with making me easier food. I couldn’t play how I wanted to due to the pain and being tired all the time, so Kanti and Aspen tried to keep me entertained by doing little competitions of who could make the biggest block tower or whatever and letting me judge. And I brought up how our room got moved downstairs after all this. I think what I’m trying to say is, maybe we can try and do something similar for your situation. Except with hands instead of the neck, if I’m making sense.”

“I thimk you’re make-ing cents,” Boris said with a nod. “All-ter-net activities, yes?”

“Yeah, alternate activities,” Kamal said. “Easy hand stuff, y’know? Like maybe card games and board games. And I know you gotta get some of that physical movement, so maybe we can get you a hacky-sack or something to try out.”

“Itse worth a try!”

\-----

The next day was already going better than the previous. Boris had felt like his hands had healed enough in order to hold onto a steering wheel for him to drive, as long as he mostly held it with his fingers rather than his palms, so he drove to the toy store to pick up some things for less hand-intensive activities. They had plenty of board games at home that they would just have to dig out of the dusty closet, so he had gotten a hacky-sack and a couple different decks of cards for various games; a standard poker deck, Uno, and a couple other miscellaneous ones that looked interesting. And now he found himself out in the driveway, kicking this little crocheted beanbag ball around. He didn’t really know what he was doing, but regardless he was keeping active and having fun!

At least he was until he kicked it too hard and too far, sending it flying into the back of Mike from Next Door’s head.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing, Habit?!” Mike from Next Door bellowed as he stormed over with the hacky-sack in hand. “If you’re gonna play around like a kid, at least have the good adult sense to be careful with your toys! You’re lucky this wasn’t a bigger, harder ball or something!”

“Oh good-ness, I am so sorrey!” Boris exclaimed, lightly jogging to meet him half-way. “I must have mis-judged my ‘strength’ with that one...”

“Just be more careful next time,” Mike from Next Door growled. He tossed the hacky-sack back to Boris, who gingerly caught it in his still-bandaged hands. Seeing that gave him a brief pause with whatever further angry rant he had planned. “What happened there?” he asked, some of the edge previously present in his voice easing up.

“Brok’n glass,” Boris said with a sigh. “Itse get-ing better though!”

“Huh.” Mike from Next Door’s demeanor softened a bit. “Hope that doesn’t give you too much trouble, then.”

Boris gave him a thumbs-up and waved before heading back inside. He really did want Mike from Next Door to be on better terms with him and his family, seemed like he was the only one in that household who was still a bit cold to them after all these months. At least it seemed to just be an issue with him, as he knew the kids went to Putunia's school and got along great with her and Linda from Next Door had always been amicable since they’d moved in. He still remembered that lovely pie she’d brought over as a welcome gift, apple was always his favorite.

He’d been able to keep himself pretty well occupied even after Kamal and Putunia got home, and they could both tell that his mood had improved greatly from being able to do more than just sit around all day. The only hiccup that happened that night was when Boris went to take his medicine before dinner. There was something extra in his little daily pill case. Little multicolored things that certainly were _not_ his medicines had been added into each day box, whether the pills that were meant to be there had been refilled or not. Confused, Boris plucked one out of Tuesday’s box and examined it. It was larger than all his pills, bright red in color, and had a little white “S” printed on one side. “Whose been putting ‘Skittles’ in my medesin box?” he asked.

“Oh, did you want MnM’s instead?” Putunia asked, pausing briefly in her play.

“Daisy, no, thatse..." Boris thought carefully about how he should explain this. “Look, you reelly shouldn’t mess around with my ‘pills’ anie-more, okay? Can you promise me that?”

Putunia frowned slightly. “I just thought candy would help make you happy,” she said. “Like how the pills help make you not be super sad.”

“I appreshiate it, I really do!” Boris reassured her with a fatherly ruffle of her hair. “Itse just that my pills aren’t the safe-est things to mess around with. I know your a big girl and you’re smart enough to not take them your-self, but I still wamt you to be carefull and not mess with them. If you want me two have candie with my medesin, just leave the candy be-side the pill box next time, okay?”

“Okay, Pops!” Putunia exclaimed, immediately returning to her playtime. Boris smiled. Even if her actions hadn’t exactly been the safest, his heart was still warmed by her intent.

\-----

After dinner, the three of them had decided to sit down for a game of Monopoly. It was bog-standard board, none of that novelty theming, and even with that two out of three participants had no clue what they were doing. For that reason, Kamal had been appointed banker. Even with the general confusion about how to play this silly game, they were all still having a pretty good time. As the turns passed, Boris moved his little thimble onto a community chest space and drew a card, his face falling slightly upon reading it. “Uh, oh...”

“So what does it say?" Kamal asked.

“Um...every-onme who’s name starts with a ‘bee’ gets five-million dollors?”

Kamal just gave him a knowing look. “Honey,” he said. “I don’t even think this game _has_ five million dollars.” Boris groaned, turning the card to show him its instructions for him to move his piece to jail. “Oh, yeah, that’s a shame.”

Putunia began fiddling with her car piece (she had _insisted_ on being the car, it _was_ the coolest piece after all), thinking about what was going on. Ever the competitive child, she obviously wanted to win, but she also didn’t want to see her pops sad, especially with everything he’d been going through lately... “Pops! I can make you a deal!” she exclaimed.

“Oh?” Boris asked. “What kind of ‘deel’?”

“I still have my get-out-of-jail-free card!" she said. “I can give it to you! But I’m gonna neeeeed...”

“Youll need whamt?”

“...twenty dollars!”

Kamal raised an eyebrow. “Is that allowed in the rules?” he asked, more to himself than the others. “I don’t remember being allowed to make exchanges like that from when we would play with Heather...”

“Are you sure abbout that, daisy?" Boris asked.

Putunia nodded, a look of determination on her face. “It’s in my personal rules!” she insisted. “I want you to be happy, Pops! And you’re not a baddie, so you shouldn't have to go to jail!”

“Going to Monopoly Jail doesn’t exactly have anything to do with the player being a bad person, y’know,” Kamal said with a light laugh.

Putunia and Boris made the exchange nonetheless, with Putunia tucking away her cash satisfied and Boris keeping the card out to be used at the earliest opportunity. Before the game could move on to the nest person’s turn, however, they heard a knock at the door. “Oh, I can ‘get’ it,” Boris said, standing up and making his way to the door. He opened the door and saw a familiar face. “Cos-mos?” he asked upon seeing their visitor. “Whamt are you do-ing here so late?”

Cosmos smiled upon seeing and hearing him, the smile reaching their eyes despite them wearing their usual face mask. Their hands were behind their back holding something unseen, so they couldn’t communicate just yet. “What do you ‘have’ be-hind your back?" Boris asked. They moved the thing behind them to their front and held it out to him: a small vase of flowers, featuring daisies and peonies and even a lily. It wasn’t a tooth lily, of course, but Cosmos probably told their mother how important lilies were to him so she must’ve tried to include the closest thing she had.

“O-oh, thamk you verie much,” Boris said. “I’d try two grabbe thate, but Ime worryed I’d shatter it. And Ive had enough of that fore a life-time...” Cosmos’s shoulders slumped slightly. They’d probably not realized his hands were still not at full usability just yet. “Just, just come-in.”

He moved out of the way so that Cosmos could enter, and once they were in they carefully placed the vase on the counter near the door. As soon as they’d gotten it set down, Putunia rushed at them and grabbed onto their legs. “Sidekick!” she exclaimed. “What brings you here?”

Cosmos playfully ruffled her hair, then turned her attention to the adults. “ _Does she know sign yet or should I answer through you guys?_ ”

“I was teach-ing her finger spelling befour...well, This,” Boris said.

Cosmos nodded, turning back to Putunia and spelling out, “ _Flowers 4 B._ ” They pointed to the vase and to Boris in case she missed what they’d said even with having slowed down their usual signing speed for her sake.

“You’ve brought Pops a present you can’t enjoy,” Putunia said, her tone oddly serious for the moment. “You truly are a noble person, sidekick!”

“Where do you even get stuff like this,” Kamal chuckled.

Once they had been freed from Putunia’s grasp, Cosmos joined Boris on the couch. “ _How’ve you been doing since that email?_ ” they asked. “ _I’m glad you can talk again at least, but other than that?_ ”

“Things are get-ting better, yes,” Boris said. “Ime still recovering physicly, but emo-shun-ly I’m more stable. I mite be abel to open the shop again soom, once my hands are done heeling.”

“ _That’s good._ ” Cosmos then reached into a pocket inside their jacket, pulling out a card and handing it to Boris. “ _This is from everyone. We’ve all been pretty worried about you since this whole thing happened, especially when you cut contact. We wanted to let you know we care about you and we’re here if you need anything._ ”

“Oh, thamk-you,” Boris said. “I’ll call evry-onme to let themn ‘know’ Ime getting better soon. I just...need-ed some time with immediete famlily onlie for a littol bit, I guess.” Cosmos nodded in understanding, leaning in to give him a bit of a side-hug. They clearly didn’t count on Boris feeling well enough to pull them into a full-on hug, but they certainly weren’t going to complain.

Cosmos stayed for a bit to socialize with Boris and the others, only leaving when they realized just how late it had gotten. They’d have to get back home with enough time to get ready for bed before school the next morning, after all. One final hug from Boris and some good pets for Webby were had, and they departed for home. After they’d left, Boris realized he hadn’t opened the card they’d given him. He decided before returning to their Monopoly game he could at least take care of that. He opened the envelope as best he could, and the card inside had a nice floral pattern on it. It was a sympathy card, probably meant for someone losing a loved one, but to be fair he felt like the damage to his flowers had the same emotional impact. Opening it up, he could see that everyone from the Habitat had indeed signed it in whatever spaces they could considering the sheer number of signatures from both the adults and the children, and even Cosmos’s mother and sister had signed it as well. The only ones missing were Kamal and Putunia, but of course they’d been here for him the entire time and probably didn’t know about this until it had been delivered.

Boris had done a lot of crying in the past week. Even though taking his medicine regularly again had helped to stabilize his emotions to a more even level, he couldn’t help but feel himself tearing up again. He was so, so loved by so many, and of course he was going to get emotional with his appreciation.

“You good to come back to Monopoly?” Kamal asked, concerned with Boris having started to cry a bit again.

“Yes,” Boris said, “Ime just verey verie happie.”

\-----

Kamal woke up in the middle of the night to an empty bed. Confused, he looked around for any hint to where Boris had gone. He knew he shouldn’t be _too_ worried given how he was improving, but anxiety brain was not his friend at that moment.

Water. He heard the tap running in the nearby bathroom, along with some pleasant humming in that deep tone he recognized. Okay, so Boris was just in the bathroom, all right. Knowing that much helped to ease his anxiety somewhat. Though now that he had the thought of water and bathrooms in his mind, he realized he kind of had to go. Not urgently, but he’d rather take care of it while it was on his mind instead of wait until morning and wake up to discomfort.

He made his way to the bathroom and gently knocked on the door, causing Boris to let out a small yelp from within. “Hon, you okay?” Kamal asked.

“Yes, Ime ‘fine’!” Boris said. “You just star-telled me, thatse all!”

“All right, sorry about that,” Kamal replied. “Think you can hurry it up in there, maybe? I gotta go too.”

“Ime all-most done,” Boris said. “Just cleaning upp.”

“Okay, cool.”

A few seconds after, the door opened and Boris stepped out, the towel still around his free hand. “Alright, bath-room’s free,” he said with a soft smile.

“Cool, thanks,” Kamal said. “I know you’ve been mostly taking care of that yourself lately, but if you want I can help redo your banda—” He gasped upon seeing Boris’s hands, now completely in view. “ _Boris what the hell is that??_ ”

“What-the hell is ‘what’?” Boris asked before looking down at his hands himself. They were completely obscured in shadow. “Oh, oops. Guess the sea-cret’s out, haha.”

“Secret, what secret?!” Kamal half-shouted, trying to stay quiet so as not to wake Putunia. “You haven’t been doing as okay as you’ve been saying, have you? Oh god, Boris, you shouldn’t hide your emotions like this...”

“No no no, itse 'fine'! Ime ‘fine’! Reelie!" Boris insisted. “This has no-thing to do with being frowny, I promise! Ime doing this on purpose!”

“On purpose?” Kamal raised an eyebrow. In all fairness, he’d forgotten Boris’s shadow form was something he could choose to do as much as it was something that could happen to him. He was obviously still concerned, but more willing to hear him out. “Why?”

“Remembrer how I was use-ing Lil Habby the day after that reallie bad night?” Boris asked. “After I came out of shadow, my ‘hands’ had healed comsiderably, a littel Faster than I thimk their supposed to. Itse how I was even abel to use Lil Habby for a couplle days.”

“So you’ve been trying to keep doing that?” Kamal asked.

Boris nodded, smiling. “And it’s Working,” he said. “The cutes have been heeling A Lot faster than the after-care instructions said they would. I know I havent been show-ing you them since the night after getting the stitches, but look!” He held out his palms so that Kamal could see, and as the shadow receded he could in fact see that the lacerations were almost entirely closed up. “Been shadow-ing themn since...Fri-day or Satterday ‘night’. Look at that inprovement!”

“Wow, they’re looking _way_ better, yeah,” Kamal said. He then looked up at Boris. “Um...what do you think about going back to the doctor to see if you can get the stitches removed?”

Boris grimaced. “Well... I domt want themn in for- _ever_ obviously...” he mused. “But at the same ‘time’... hopspittals...” He let out a heavy sigh. “Bokay,” he said. “I thimk tommorrow...but onley if your ‘free’ to come with me. For sup-port.”

“I can do that, yeah,” Kamal said. “I only have a couple cleanings tomorrow, Keally can easily cover for me. And if you want, I can help you fix up the shop whenever you’re ready for that too.”

“Weak-end,” Boris said. “If the stitches can come Out, I will start that on the weekened. Thamk you for offering two help with thate.”

Kamal gave him a warm smile. “Boris. Come on. Who helped you get everything set up in the first place?”

Boris smiled as well, pulling Kamal into a hug. “I love you so much, lily. Thank you, thamk yuo so _so_ much.”

“I love you too,” Kamal said. “We should probably get back to bed, then. Gotta be well-rested before a stressful hospital visit, after all.” Boris agreed with this, and soon enough both of them had returned to bed and fallen asleep, both excited and nervous for what was to come the next day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beating the boredom and some decent physical healing, nice to see that things are getting better and better. A little visit from a friend certainly doesn’t hurt, ‘specially when they bring a reminder of how much so many people care c: Next chapter’s the final one, and it’ll finally be time to take care of that big mess in a safer manner. Hopefully it won’t be too distressing for Boris to get that done...


	7. Return to Normalcy

“Well, Boris, looks like you’re one of the lucky ones,” Dr. Terrance said upon taking a look at Boris’s hands. “With lacerations that deep, I figured it’d take anywhere from two to three weeks to fully close up.”

“Yeah, guess I am luckie,” Boris said, letting out a bit of a nervous laugh. He didn’t know how much experience Dr. Terrance had with “weird” things, so he didn’t know how much he could say, but even so he was glad to have his situation examined by the same person as last time. Dr. Terrance's bedside manner had made the previous visit marginally easier. “So can we re-move the stitches now?” Boris asked. “Is it ‘safe’ two-do that yet?”

“The way it looks, I’d say so,” Dr. Terrance said with a nod. “I won’t need to put any needles in you this time, so that’ll be easier at least. I’ll warn you that there’s gonna be some pressure and a slight tugging sensation while I remove the thread, but there shouldn’t be any pain.”

“Thatse a releaf.”

With the examination having finished, Dr. Terrance got to work removing the stitching. The tugging sensation of having the thread pulled up high enough to be safely snipped was annoying, but thankfully he had been right with his assumption that there would be no pain. Still, Boris’s mind kept imagining that there would be, and Kamal held his free hand throughout the whole thing. Soon enough, all the thread had been removed, and Boris was glad to have his hands back to full usage once again. Of course, he had to ask the most important question in relation to all this. “Would it be ‘safe’ for me too garden again?” he asked. “Or do I hav-to wait longer for that?”

“Well, normally I’d discourage strenuous activity right after having hand stitches removed,” Dr. Terrance said, “but given how well you’ve healed I’d say it probably won’t be much of an issue for you to start that up again. We didn’t even have to add any medical tape to that. Of course, come back in if you notice anything abnormal, like red streaking on the wounds or sudden numbness. And _definitely_ come back in asap if they split open again, but I don’t know if you’re in danger of that specifically. Still, doesn’t hurt to watch out for that.”

With all that taken care of, Boris and Kamal were free to go. Boris was leaving the hospital in much higher spirits this time, and for very good reason. He was _free!_ Free from bandages, free from stitches, free from all of this! Well, aside from the antibiotics, he still had to finish those for reasons he couldn’t remember in the moment. But there was only one dose left, maybe two at most, and then he’d be free from that too!

“Hey, wanna pick up some ice cream or something on the way home?” Kamal asked as they reached the car.

“Iced creams sound loveley!” Boris said with delight. “Though should I go with ‘mint’ or some-thing different for an intresting change of pace...”

“Personally after something like this, I’d go with something familiar and comforting,” Kamal said, “but you’re the one who’s gonna eat it so you’re the one who’s making that decision.”

“I’ll dee-side when we get their,” Boris laughed. As he got into the car (it was his own again, his hands having felt well enough to grip the steering wheel more directly), he couldn’t help but examine his hands again. Even though they were pretty much healed now, he was probably going to be doing this a lot given the new scars left behind. Still, he wiggled his fingers gleefully with a dexterity he hadn’t had access to in a week. He was going to give Webster _so many_ good pets when they got home.

\-----

The rest of the week was more or less Boris getting back to normalcy. He had almost immediately returned to his garden, taking care not to push himself too much but still glad to give his flowers the personal touch that he’d been unable to provide for what felt like forever. Webster was so happy to have his big dad give him the good pets like he used to, and Willow had become a little less aloof as well. Putunia had finished the big drawing of Boris she’d been working on all week and presented it to him over dinner, and Boris absolutely adored it, awkwardly taped pieces of paper and all. It was a sign that everything was getting better. He could only hope that he was able to keep these high spirits during the weekend.

He would need that with the plans they had.

Sunday came quicker than expected, though that was to be expected given that time seemed to pass faster when you were enjoying it. Boris had wanted to take care of cleaning up the shop then rather than Saturday both because it would give him an extra day to mentally prepare for this and because less people would be in the area on a Sunday morning. Kamal was coming for support, of course, and Putunia had insisted on coming for the same reason, so the three of them were piled into the car and on their way. Understandably, Boris was both excited for and dreading this. He was obviously excited to open the shop back up, but he was also worried that seeing the shop in its current state would bring back all his bad feelings all over again. Well, only one way to find out.

“You ready to get started?” Kamal asked, putting a reassuring hand on Boris’s shoulder while they were still in the car.

“As reddy as I’ll ever be, I guess,” Boris said. He took in a deep breath through his nose and let it out of his mouth in a long sigh. “Let’s get this over with.”

Boris was the first one out of the car, with Kamal and Putunia following shortly after. They had parked a decent distance away from the shop itself to give Boris a bit more time to prepare himself on the walk over. As they approached the shop, Putunia couldn’t help but let out a gasp upon seeing it, one that she swiftly cut off as she thought it might distress her pops. Though looking at it now, Boris was somehow not as upset as he thought he might be. It was more of an empty resignation than that deep pit of sadness from the initial incident. He imagined it might get worse as the cleanup effort went on...

The cleaning started much less panicked than Boris’s first attempt. There were still week-old blood stains on the floor, but thankfully no one was adding to it this time. “Care-flul with the brok’n glass, daisy,” Boris warned Putunia as she was helping to sweep up the big solid debris.

“Don’t worry, Pops, I’m being safe!” she insisted as she swept. Sure enough, she was being uncharacteristically careful, taking her sweeping slow and steady. Good thing too, as some of that part of the mess included glass bits.

“Thatse good,” Boris said. He’d felt he wasn’t up to the task of cleaning up the now completely rotten flower debris, so he tasked himself with mopping up his own dried blood. They’d brought a couple bottles of hydrogen peroxide to make that specific part easier, and spreading the fluid along the stain was definitely doing the trick. The blood remnants bubbled and foamed in the peroxide, and honestly it looked really gross but it was getting scrubbed away so he wouldn’t have to look at it for very long.

Even with the three of them working together, the cleanup was slow going. It certainly didn’t help that Boris kept stopping to mourn for the rotten flowers or to examine those that were remaining, which then led to him praising Kamal for stopping by to take care of them as best he’d been able to in his stead. By lunchtime, it was clear that at this rate the job was going to take a lot longer than Boris had wanted. He was feeling that sadness again, thankfully not nearly as bad as the initial incident but it still hurt. “Hey, why don’t we take a lunch break?” Kamal suggested. “Getting some food in us might make things easier, y’know.”

“Goode idea,” Boris said. “I could use some-thing to eat, yes.”

“I want a Happy Meal!” Putunia exclaimed, quickly following it up with, “Please!”

“Sorry, Tunes, I was just gonna walk down to the cafe,” Kamal chuckled. “How about this, though, I can go a bit further to that Dairy Queen just past it and get you a kid’s meal, that okay?”

“Yeah, that’s good!” Putunia said with a smile.

Kamal got both their orders and left the shop, and because it was a more soothing environment Boris retreated to the back with Putunia soon following. The flowers in there were happy to have him back and their little whispers reassured him of such. “I’ve miss-ed you all two,” Boris said with a soft smile, gently stroking the leaves of the nearest chrysanthemum with the tips of his fingers like one would a sensitive pet.

“Do the flowers really talk to you?” Putunia asked. “Can you actually hear them say things?”

Boris thought for a bit before responding. Truthfully, he didn’t know how to explain what this was. “Itse...more like a feel-ing, if that makes sense,” he eventually settled on. “Less like actual talk-ing, more like I just get an ideya in the back of my mind as two what the plants might ‘say’ if they could. I domt fully understand how it works my-self, I just know that it does.”

“Oh, okay.” Putunia watched as Boris gave every salvaged plant some extra care, then she asked, “Are they happy?”

“Yes, their verey happy," Boris said. “They’re happie to see me again, and with people who care ab-out me."

“The flowers sound pretty nice.”

“Very nice in-deed.”

Boris continued examining all the flowers, and Putunia observed in an uncharacteristically quiet manner. Even at her age, she could tell this was very important to him and she didn’t want to interrupt. Soon enough, Kamal returned with lunch, announcing his presence with a small knock against the door frame to the back room. “Hey, I ran into some people as I was coming back,” he said as he handed Boris and Putunia their meals. “They’re dropping by to lend a hand.”

“Oh, reelly?” Boris asked. “Uh, who was it?”

“The Habitat.”

Boris’s eyes widened in surprise. He both made his way back into the main area of the shop. Sure enough, through the remnants of the broken window he could see just about every one of the former Habititians, both young and old. They’d brought extra cleaning supplies, new shelves, cans of fresh paint, and someone had even brought a truck carrying a new window and door to replace the old broken ones. “There he is!” Jimothan exclaimed with a wave. “There’s the man of the hour!”

“Evryone...” Boris gasped. He felt the hint of tears starting to sting his eyes, but he tried his best to keep that to a minimum. It’d be hard to take care of this with salty water clouding his vision, after all. “What are yuo all do-ing here?”

“We came to help ya out, of course!” Borbra said with a laugh. “Heard you were gettin’ the shop back in shape, so we all figured you could use the extra help.”

“No, no, I got ‘that’,” Boris said. “I mean, how did you Know we were doing this to-day? The only one I thinnk we told was...” It was then that he saw one more person join the crowd, a certain flower delivery scamp. They gave him a friendly wave, their eyes squinted from the smile that had presumably formed under their mask. Boris couldn’t help but laugh. “Of course you did,” he said, a smile on his face as well. “Your just a nat-u-ral helper, after all.”

The three who had arrived first still had to finish their lunch, but after that everyone was ready to get to work, and everyone was pitching in however they could. The first big thing to go was the old window. Once they had managed to pry that broken old thing safely out of its space, Gillis, Borbra, and Jim set about getting the new one installed where it had once been. Trencil aided in setting out new vases on freshly cleaned counters, and even though he wasn’t a fan of the floral scent in the air Randy had gladly joined in. Marv was quickly putting together new shelves right out of the box—for an old man usually focused on fishing, he was quite the handyman and very nimble with a screwdriver and hammer. Anyone who hadn’t assigned themselves to a specific role helped to clear out the debris and move supplies.

The walls were getting a new coat of paint while the place was already being fixed up, so most of the kids had been roped into this in order to keep them out of the more dangerous projects. The painting was being monitored by Boris and Dallas, the latter for the obvious reasons and the former because it was the least worrisome thing for him to focus on out of everything. “Soooo, Boris, you doin’ better after all that uncool stuff?” Dallas asked.

“A _lot_ better,” Boris said as he spread pale orange paint against the wall. Orange was usually used in a way that was meant to excite the viewer, but as this was a very light shade of it the color shouldn’t be too busy on the eye. Besides, he was planning on putting a lot of different designs on the walls anyway, so if anything was going to be “busy” art-wise it would be those.

“Glad to hear it, dude,” Dallas said, leaning against the wall. “You deserve happiness and healing, y’know? Sunflowers and rainbows and all that.”

“And you desserve to have Clean Clothes,” Boris said with a grin, “which you’re leening on wet ‘paint’ is taking away from you right now.”

Dallas took a bit to process what he’d said, and once he had he peeled himself away from the freshly painted wall. Predictably he’d taken some of the paint with him, and there was now a large orange smear down his arm and on the sleeve of his shirt. “Woops,” he chuckled, amused. “Well, it won’t be the first time this shirt’s got paint on it, y’know? I should probably cover up that spot I took off the wall though, hehe.”

“No, I’ve got it, I still have the roll-er.” Boris quickly swiped over the smeared paint spot with the roller.

“I’m honestly surprised that you’re able to push yourself like this so soon,” Randy said, taking a break after finishing up his cleaning job. “I remember some time ago when I unfortunately injured myself at a very crucial moment of my performance, I had been forced into a medical boot for nearly two months. And here you are less than two weeks after your injury and you’re already making strides back into normalcy!”

Boris nervously laughed. “Well, stiches are alot different from a busted ankel,” he said. He couldn’t remember if he’d ever revealed his shadow form to Randy via telling or showing, nor could he remember that with several people that were here helping for that matter, and even so he didn’t want to startle anyone by displaying it just then.

“I’m just glad the family was understanding about all this,” Gillis said as he walked over, giving Randy a loving shoulder pat before pulling him into a light hug. “Holiday time and all, not really supposed to be doing any work but they got me wanting to help out a friend.”

“A holly-day?” Boris gave him a confused look. ‘Did I ‘miss’ a holladay in my Funk?” he asked, more to himself than to Gillis. Before Gillis could respond, Boris manage to process what he meant. “Oh, happy holiday!” he exclaimed. “Sorrey I domt know if theirs a proper greeting for it, I hope it’s one of the ones where you get to have tastey foods!”

“Yeah, this one involves a lot of dairy and reading,” Gillis chuckled, a big grin on his face. He looked like he was about to continue excitedly talking about it, but he instead let out a surprised grunt as Tim Tam pushed past the two men to get closer to Boris themself. “Hey, that’s not okay!” he half-shouted. “You gotta learn to stop doing stuff like that before you get out of your runt phase.”

Tim Tam didn’t respond to Gillis, instead trying to grab at Boris’s hands. “Scars,” they said. “Show them.”

“Dearest Tim Tam, it would be best that you not push the matter,” Randy said. “He might not wish to be so open about that just yet.”

“Oh, no, it’s okey,” Boris said. He held out his hands and let them examine the still somewhat fresh scars on his hands. As they were taking their time to look at the scars, the other kids started to get curious about them as well, so Boris decided to let them see as well. “Now just be care-full, their still a liitle bit ‘sore’ if you press in two har— _oww_.” He winced as Trevor accidentally pushed the big scar too hard with his thumb on his turn.

“Sorry!” Trevor said. He made sure to be gentler with the rest of his relatively quick look. “Wow, it’s like you pushed your hand down on a big line of legos or something,” he mused.

“Yes, I sup-pose so...”

The rest of the cleanup effort went along incredibly well. There were a few other silly shenanigans, of course, mostly from the kids. Gerry had accidentally stepped in the paint tray and tracked a decently long trail of orange footprints across the teal tiles before someone noticed, and Millie and Tim Tam had drawn a few inappropriate doodles along the wall where a shelf was going to be placed, but even if they would be hidden by a solid object the doodles were quickly covered by paint as well. Debris was removed, shelves were replaced, the solid orange walls were painted over with intricate floral designs.

By the end of the day, the shop looked almost exactly as it had the day before Boris had first opened for business. It was wonderful. “Every-one, thank you so _so_ much for comeing to help,” Boris said as people were starting to get ready to go home. “I don’t know if this would-of gone as well if it had juste been us three.”

“Hey, it’s no trouble at all,” Ronbo said, adding his usual clownish “ _hnk_ ”. No idea why he came to the cleanup in his clown outfit, maybe he’d just left work.

“Yeah, you’re a friend!” Mirphy exclaimed. “And even if it wasn’t your original intention, you _did_ pretty much bring us all together, so we might as well repay the favor.”

“Even so, I appreshiate each and evvrey one of you.” As the crowd began to thin and Boris saw Cosmos going to get their bike, he stopped them briefly. “And thamk you most of all fore letting everybody ‘know’ about this and gathering them all hear!” he said, pulling them into a friendly hug.

“ _You need anything else before we’re all gone?_ ” Cosmos asked. “ _Anything more I can help with, at least?_ ”

“Cos-mos, you are so goode,” Boris said, “but the only thing ‘left’ I can think of is some-thing that Kamal and I can take care of.”

Cosmos gave him a thumbs-up and a wave, then they grabbed their bike and rode away. As everyone else was on their way, Boris went back into the shop to grab that final thing. “You still have the stepladder from last time, right?” Kamal asked.

“Oh, of coarse!” Boris said. He quickly popped into the back and soon returned with a large piece of fabric and the requested stepladder. “Letse get this hung up reel quick and then we can head ‘home’.”

“Can I help??” Putunia asked enthusiastically, smears of the orange wall paint still on her cheek.

“I dunno, Tunes, this is a grown-up job,” Kamal said. “Even with the stepladder I don’t think you’d be tall enough to handle this, and I kinda need the stepladder myself anyway.”

“Well, may-be she can,” Boris said with a grin. He handed Putunia one end of the fabric, then carefully picked her up and put her up on his shoulders. “See? My tol makes me the ‘best’ ladder!”

“Heck yeah, Pops! Let’s gooo!”

With that having been settled, Kamal took hold of the other end of the fabric and carefully ascended the stepladder. Once they were both at the proper height, they attached the banner to the overhang outside.

**_Daisy Chain’s Grand Re-Openning - June 12!!! :-D_ **

“It looks great,” Kamal said with a warm smile. “Sure you’re gonna be good to get back to work so soon, though?”

“Ime more than reddy, my-self,” Boris said as he helped Putunia off his shoulders and back onto the ground. “Itse more of that being the early-est I can imagine being abel to get everything to full function with the Product to Sell. I lovbe the flowers I managed to salvage, of coarse, but the customers will want More.”

Kamal nodded. “Makes sense.”

“You’re gonna make everyone so happy again!” Putunia exclaimed. “Everyone’s gonna love your flowers!”

“Hehe, I sure ‘hope’ so.”

\-----

A couple weeks had passed since Boris’s flower shop had been able to get back to normal. He’d had to special order previously-grown flowers to replace much of his stock in a timely manner, but it was worth it to return to normalcy sooner. The “ _Grand Re-Openning!_ ” banner was still hanging over the door, and while he’d meant to take it down just a few days after reopening he just never got around to it. At least the art was good!

The bell on the door rang as someone stepped in, and Boris made his way out of the back room to greet the new arrival. “Good after-noo—oh!” Boris gasped upon seeing who had arrived. “Lily!” he exclaimed. “And Cos-mos! What are you two do-ing hear right now?”

“Figured I’d stop by for a bit and take my lunch break with you for a change,” Kamal said. “Then I ran into Cos on their way here so we walked the rest of the way together.”

“Oh right, the high-school should be out now too.” Boris laughed a little. “Would you like to ‘join’ us for luncch?”

Cosmos thought for a bit, then nodded while adding, “ _If you call my mom first. I only really came to say bye real quick._ ”

Boris looked at them, concerned. “Goodbye?” he asked. “Are you going some-where?”

“ _Family vacation. We’re heading to a beach resort for a week._ ”

“That soundes like fun!” Boris said. “I hope you and your famlily enjoy the bitch!” Kamal snorted with laughter upon hearing this, and it took Boris a few seconds to realize what he’d said. Once he had, however, he hid his face in shame. “ _Nooooo_ , I’m sorrey Cosmoooos, Im sorrie you had two here thaaaat...”

Cosmos tapped on his hand gently to get him to look at them, hints of a mischievous grin visible in their eyes. “ _Did you forget I’m 17 and not seven? I’ve watched at least one R-rated movie by now. I’ve heard, thought, and said the word ‘bitch’ a few times. You’re good, B-lily._ ”

“Oh, okey, thatse a releaf,” Boris said with a sigh. “I sometimes fore-get your almost an adult.” Cosmos gave him a thumbs-up, then held out their hand for a high five which he gladly reciprocated.

“They’re not the only one whose family is going out of town for a bit, remember?” Kamal asked with a wink. “We gotta go say hi to the newest member of the family, after all.”

Boris let out a small gasp. “How did I fore-get about Violetta??” He clapped his hands and jumped up and down a little bit, his clicking heels sounding nice on the tile. “I camt wait, we’re finally goimg to meet our niece!!”

“ _Say hi to your niece for me, then._ ”

“I think we’ll say hi to everyone else for ya instead,” Kamal said. “They’ll be old enough to actually appreciate it.”

Due to Kamal’s need to get back to the clinic in something of a reasonable timeframe, the three of them figured they should go ahead and head to lunch already. Boris quickly made a call to Cosmos’s mother to let her know they would be having lunch with them, and once that was over they were on their way. That extra spring in Boris’s step was noticeable as they all walked down to the cafe, and Kamal was happy to see that happiness back.

Things had gotten a lot better, and it looked like they were gonna stay that way for a long time to come.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we’re done! Wow, can you believe this chapter was almost done before I fully realized I’d never named this version of Boris’s flower shop until now? To be fair it’s probably only random customers who’d usually refer to it by name, the former Habititians probably just call it “Boris’s shop” and forget it has a proper name a lot of the time. You could say that calling the shop Daisy Chain is meaningful on multiple levels. It’s cute and floral, it includes Boris’s nickname for his daughter, and it references how flowers linked him to so many good people in his life now :3c
> 
> Also a sidenote, the holiday that Gillis mentioned is Shavuot! Tav has a headcanon that he’s Jewish and that he wants to share those traditions with Randy, and I wanted to make reference to that cuz it’s a good headcanon. Apparently one of the rules of this holiday is that you’re not supposed to do “creative work” during it and idk if lifting a glass pane counts as that, but we ummm kinda planned this part out before deciding on concrete dates (the cleanup is on June 4, 1995) and also Gillis is one of the few Habititians with the strength to lift that thing. ^^; I’d be willing to bet there are exceptions to that, like very specific situations like this one? Even so I don’t think fic is the place to get into the implications of possible religious fundamentalism if that isn’t the plot focus, and even if I _were_ to get into that for some reason, I would stick to christian sects as that’s what I have personal experiences with. I can tell you the story about how a spot of hydrophobia saved me from being forced into a contract with a deity I don’t believe in and who wouldn’t accept me if I did, but that’s for another time and another place entirely. :P


End file.
